President Aslan Maskhadov of Chechnya charged yesterday that people close to President Boris Yeltsin of Russia were behind the violence in Dagestan in August and September, the Interfax news agency reported
The warlord, Mr Shamil Bassayev, had "unfortunately allowed himself to be drawn into" the affair, Mr Maskhadov added.
Speaking at a press conference, he appealed to Western countries to "at least not help Russia to fund the war with Chechnya".
He said he was ready to accept a peacekeeping force led by the international community, as well as inspectors from international organisations, Western countries and Russia.
"Show us the terrorist bases and we will destroy them ourselves," he added.
Mr Maskhadov stressed that the Islamist rebels who crossed into the Russian republic of Dagestan in August and September were the cause of the current Russian advance into Chechnya.
On Friday Russia announced it no longer recognised the rule of Mr Maskhadov over the breakaway Caucasian republic, denouncing his decision earlier last week to enlist Mr Bassayev to defend Chechnya's eastern front.
Moscow has accused Chechnya of harbouring the rebels and holds
Mr Bassayev responsible for a series of bomb attacks on apartment buildings that have killed close to 300 people in Russia since August 31st.
Mr Bassayev has twice led Islamic fighters into Dagestan in the past two months and in September threatened to unleash a wave of Islamic suicide attacks on Russia unless Moscow halted its air strikes on the rebel republic.
Mr Maskhadov has denied any official Chechen involvement in either the fighting in Dagestan or the terrorist attacks in Russia.
He said yesterday that a face-to-face meeting with Mr Yeltsin could settle all their problems.
His allegations of Kremlin involvement in the Dagestan conflict parallel remarks made last week by Gen Alexander Lebed of Russia in an interview with the French newspaper Le Figaro.
Gen Lebed suggested that the Kremlin and Mr Bassayev between them had organised the terrorist attacks in Russia, in an attempt to destabilise the country and create a state of emergency that would allow Mr Yeltsin to stay in power.
Gen Lebed, who negotiated the 1996 ceasefire between Moscow and Grozny, is the governor of the Siberian region of Krasnoyarsk and a contender for the 2000 presidential elections.
Mr Bassayev dismissed the repudiation by the Russian Prime Minister, Mr Vladimir Putin, of his legitimacy.
He was elected by the Chechen people in elections held under the auspices of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, he said. "In the end Russia will lose the entire Caucasus," Mr Maskhadov predicted. "We've already beaten Russia once. Now we've got enough weapons and ample experience. This will be a war across all of the Caucasus, and it will be suicidal for Russia."
After days of denying that its forces were inside Chechnya, the Russian general staff confirmed that the troops had crossed the borders and admitted clashes with guerrilla fighters.
The Chechen government spoke of heavy fighting that had lasted for up to six hours.
"Federal troops have crossed into Chechnya from several metres to a few kilometres," said Russia's First Deputy Chief-of-Staff, Col Gen Valery Manilov.
He said the troops were engaged in the declared aim of establishing a "deep" buffer zone intended to seal Chechnya off and prevent Islamist rebels from exporting their campaign.