**A retrial over the killing of Russian investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya has opened in Moscow.**Sergei Khadzhikurbanov and brothers Dzhabrail and Ibragim Makhmudov were acquitted in February of involvement in Ms Politkovskaya’s death.
But critics said the trial was farcical and Russia’s Supreme Court ordered a retrial over procedural violations.
Ms Politkovskaya was a staunch critic of the Kremlin - her supporters allege official involvement in her death.
The Kremlin has dismissed such claims.
None of the three men standing trial in Moscow are accused of being the actual killer.
The suspected gunman, Rustam Makhmudov - brother of two of the other suspects - has still not been caught. And campaigners say it is those who ordered the killing that they really want to see in the dock.
The Supreme Court decision to order a retrial - taking place at the same military court in Moscow where the first trial was held - came after prosecutors appealed against the original not-guilty verdicts.
The process of the trial was also strongly criticised by Russian journalists and human rights groups.
Ms Politkovskaya’s supporters have always said that even guilty verdicts would not be satisfactory while the killer remains at large.
Her son, Ilya Politkovsky, told the AFP news agency he would use the retrial to “insist that the case be sent back to investigators”.
Ms Politkovskaya, who gained prominence by exposing human rights abuses by the Russian army in Chechnya, was shot dead in the entrance hall of her apartment building in Moscow in 2006.
She was the 13th journalist to be killed in a contract-style killing in Russia during Vladimir Putin’s period as president, according to the US-based Committee to Protect Journalists.