With a packed programme from environment lectures to self defence classes, Russia's beleaguered opposition is staging its first camp to rival the annual summer get-together of Vladimir Putin's supporters.

The four-day camp -- set up as an alternative to the massive Seliger camp attended by thousands of pro-Kremlin youth group members for the last years -- opened on Friday in the Khimki forest outside Moscow.

An eclectic mix of opposition activists and environmentalists pitched tents, led by charismatic campaigner Yevgenia Chirikova who has turned a fight against roadbuilding through the Khimki forest into a high-profile cause.

The atmosphere at AntiSeliger was in complete contrast to the pro-authorities event at Lake Seliger in the northwestern Tver region, which has been attended in the past by Prime Minister Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev.

The Yabloko liberal party doled out porridge from a field kitchen, while the speakers at the opening included the shaven-headed leader of the radical Left Front, Sergei Udaltsov, and the head of WWF Russia, Igor Chestin.

The camp came as Russia prepares for parliamentary elections in December and crucial presidential elections in 2012, and activists from Russia's fragmented opposition said they hoped it would build bridges.

"We understand very well that when we act alone, piecemeal, we achieve far less results, and it is much simpler for the authorities to handle us," said Udaltsov.

"There are all sorts of groups here, from ecologists to political activists and right activists, whoever. But we all feel that the current political elite is not in power legitimately," activist Roman Dobrokhotov told AFP.

"We have come here and shown that they cannot break us up when we there are lots of us," said the popular blogger as he pitched a tent.

Riot police manned the entrance to the forest with several buses and an armed vehicle, but allowed arriving activists and journalists to pass freely.

"There won't be any sensations today," one officer told journalists.

Set among oak trees and beside a small lake, the camp had more than 50 tents pitched on Friday as cars continued to arrive along a rutted track, with participants including several small children.

Organiser Chirikova expressed her relief at the peaceful start.

"I am very happy at how it has started. It's great that everything went off without problems and the police behaved decently," she said at the opening.

Wearing a pin-tucked white top and jeans, Chirikova stood on an improvised stage of plants to list the rules of the camp: tolerance to different political views -- and no alcohol.

Also on the agenda are corruption-exposing blogger Alexei Navalny as well as self-defence classes from martial arts champion Pavel Boloyangov, who also acts as Chirikova's bodyguard.

Chirikova has powerfully promoted a grassroots campaign against a highway through the Khimki forest. She and other activists have regularly been detained and several are currently on trial for a mass demonstration outside the town's municipal offices.

By contrast, the controversial Seliger camp has featured mass weddings of activists and photocollages of jailed oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky and veteran rights campaigner Lyudmila Alexeyeva in Nazi caps.

"Seliger is a state event that is organised from above. They invite apolitical young people and entertain them and spend a huge amounts on it, and it's a way to skim off money," Chirikova told AFP.

"We are not holding an event that is forced on us from above. It is by citizens for citizens. It's our event and it's really grassroots, no one forced us or paid us... For Russia, this is a rarity."

She said the event aimed to teach people what to do if they encountered injustice, "so they know step-by-step how a citizen of modern Russia can stand up for honour, dignity and rights."

"Politics is when you do something concrete. It is just that this word has become very devalued in Russia," she said.

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