One of France's biggest-ever criminal trials - a case in which 66 men and women are accused of raping children "sold" by their parents for pitiful sums of money and cigarettes - opened yesterday in the western city of Angers.

The case is expected to last four months and is being heard in a specially constructed wooden hall in the law courts built to accommodate the 60 lawyers, many of the 45 victims, and the accused, who face sentences ranging up to life imprisonment if convicted.

Sixty lawyers are involved in the trial, and the 430-page prosecution case will take four clerks three days to read out to the three judges and the nine-person jury to be selected.

Proceedings are closed to the public but covered by news reporters, 150 of whom have been accredited. Outside, police blocked the street and bystanders watched with curiousity as the defendants arrived in a number of vans.

The testimony to be heard from the victims, who were aged from six months to 12 years at the time, has been deemed so painful that jury members will have access to a special psychiatric team.

Details of the allegations against the 39 men and 27 women make appalling reading. All come from the poorest and least educated sections of society, and lived in the Saint-Leonard quarter of Angers, a largely pleasant and leafy historic town.

Investigators were alerted to the network when they decided to keep tabs on Eric Joubert, a former convicted sex offender released in 1999 who was supposed to be undergoing a course of psychiatry. He and another former offender, Franck Vergondy, are alleged to have founded the ring.

According to the prosecution, between 1999 and 2002, nearly 50 children were raped or abused - though the overall number could be much higher.

The prosecution has gathered evidence said to show that parents bartered their own children for small sums of money, food parcels and cartons of cigarettes. One girl of 10 was allegedly raped by more than 30 adults.

PHOTO CAPTION

An unidentified suspect hides upon arrival at the courthouse in Angers, western France, Friday, March 4, 2005, on the second day of the trial of 66 people accused of involvement in the rape, sexual abuse and prostitution of dozens of children and babies as young as 6 months. Investigators say 45 children, aged up to 14 years, were abused by their parents or people close to them from 1999 to 2002, in some cases in exchange for small amounts of money, food, cigarettes, and alcohol. (AP)