Ex-policeman charged over death of Kremlin critic

Russian investigators have charged a former policeman with helping to organise the killing of journalist and Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskaya almost six years ago.

The case has come to symbolise the stifling of free speech and the corruption of the judiciary during Vladimir Putin’s 2000-2008 presidency, and is now seen as a test for reform since Putin returned to the Kremlin in May.

At the time of her death in 2006, Ms Politkovskaya had been investigating human rights abuses in Chechnya and high-level corruption across Russia.

Investigators accused the former Moscow city policeman Dmitry Pavlyuchenkov of following the 58-year-old victim in the days before she was murdered. He was also accused of giving the gunman the weapon used to kill her in the hallway of her Moscow apartment in 2006.