Three men have been formally charged over the 2017 murder of Daphne Caruana Galizia, a Maltese anti-corruption journalist and blogger who was killed by a car bomb in November 2017.

Brothers Alfred and George Degiorgio, and Vincent Muscat, all in their fifties, were arrested in December of that year.

The justice ministry’s confirmation of the charges, which allows a trial to be held, came on Tuesday just days before a 20-month deadline. The public prosecutor has further 20 months to set a date for the trial, which legal experts say may not take place for years.

Late last week the government of Joseph Muscat, prime minister, at the recommendation of the Council of Europe, ordered a public inquiry into whether the 16 October 2017 attack could have been prevented.

Caruana Galizia, described as a “one-woman WikiLeaks”, was responsible for corruption exposés targeting Muscat and opposition figures. After the murder Malta asked American and Dutch experts to help with its investigation.

However, Caruana Galizia’s sons demanded Muscat’s resignation, accusing him of surrounding himself with crooks, creating a culture of impunity and turning the tiny Mediterranean state into a “mafia island”.