MOSCOW -- Russia turned with fury on its rebel southern region of Chechnya on Friday only hours after the area's latest hijacking ended with the deaths of five hostages and a gunman.


A government statement, blaming the local president, Dzhokhar Dudayev, for crimes in neighbouring southern Russia, said Moscow would be "obliged to protect" those threatened by violence in lawless Chechnya.


"The policy of the current Chechen leadership has become the main destabilising factor in the North Caucasus," said the statement carried by the Itar-Tass news agency. "Organised criminal groups permanently infiltrate from Chechnya to commit dangerous crimes."


The Caucasian region, which declared independence from Moscow in 1990, has won no international recognition. After a stand-off between Russian and Chechen forces which brought them close to bloodshed, Russia has in effect ignored the region.


But the statement, which followed a much softer line taken by President Boris Yeltsin earlier this week, seemed to indicate that the Kremlin was ready to act to reassert control.


The statement accused Dudayev of supressing opposition by force and killing hundreds of people.


"The Russian government declares with determination that if violence is used against Russia's citizens in Chechen republic, be they Chechens or Russians, it will be obliged to protect them in accordance with the Russian constitution," it added.


Moscow's message was hammered home by Presidential Council member Emil Payin, who told national television he blamed shadowy criminals from Chechnya for organising the kidnappings.


"This is the fourth terrorist act in a short time, in a single place, carried out by representatives of Chechnya. I don't think it is a coincidence," Presidential Council member Emil Payin told national television.


Chechens, conquered last century by Tsarist armies, are still feared by many Russians for their countrywide mafias and their traditional code of blood vengeance.