Representatives of a prominent Russian non-governmental organisation were on their way to London today for talks with a Chechen rebel envoy on ways to stop the war in Chechnya.

Almost 5,000 Russian soldiers were killed in the breakaway republic of Chechnya last year and more than 13,000 were wounded, the ITAR-Tass news agency quoted military officials as saying today in the first apparent acknowledgement of high casualties in the near 3 1/2-year-old conflict.