Chinese President Hu Jintao, forced to abandon a G8 summit in Italy by ethnic violence in restive Xinjiang, said that maintaining social stability in the energy-rich region was the “most urgent task”, state television reported on Thursday.

Hu described Sunday’s riots in the regional capital Urumqi, where 156 people were killed and 1,080 wounded when minority Muslim Uighurs attacked majority Han Chinese, as a “serious violent crime elaborately planned and organized by ‘three forces’ at home and abroad”, an apparent reference to religious extremists, separatists and terrorists.

Hu, who doubles as Communist Party chief, told the decision-making Politburo late on Wednesday that local authorities should “isolate and deal a blow to the small group” of rioters and to “unite and educate the majority” of Uighurs.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang shrugged off Turkey’s call for the U.N. Security Council to discuss ways of ending the violence, saying Xinjiang was an internal affair.

Thousands of Chinese troops took up position in riot-damaged streets of Urumqi, a show of force aimed at stifling ethnic violence.

But some residents worried about how the two sides could ever co-exist again.

Beijing cannot afford to lose its grip on Xinjiang, a vast desert territory that borders Russia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, has abundant oil reserves and is China’s largest natural gas-producing region.

“This whole thing may go on for a few days, but eventually the government has to use force, there’s no question about that,” said Bo Zhiyue, senior research fellow and China politics expert at National University of Singapore’s East Asian Institute.

The notices, posted on walls in the Chinese and Uighur languages, say that those who hide or protect “criminals” will also be punished. The death penalty is common in China, even for economic crimes.

The line of troops, armored vehicles and trucks measuring several kilometers and blasting out the propaganda passed for about 25 minutes through Saimachang, the Uighur neighborhood where hundreds of women protested on Tuesday.

Helicopters flying only a few meters above rooftops scattered propaganda leaflets over the crowd of hundreds who gathered to watch the security forces march by.

Troops mounted on the truck with guns and riot shields shouted slogans in unison and some of the trucks carried signs in Chinese, one of which read “separatists bring calamity to the country and its people”.

The Uighur woman, Adila, said her husband had been taken away on Monday by police although he had just arrived back from the city of Yili in Xinjiang where he works as a truck driver.

“He works for a Han man, but I’m not sure we can work with Han people now. They hate us, and we are scared of them.”

The violence prompted President Hu Jintao to abandon a G8 summit in Italy and he returned home to monitor developments in Xinjiang where hundreds have been arrested in the ensuing crackdown. Financial markets have been unaffected.

Sunday’s rioters were mostly from the southern part of Xinjiang, the English-language China Daily quoted Adina, the wife of a neurosurgeon at the regional People’s Hospital, as saying.

“They had different accents, wore different clothes, and beat up even Uighur girls who wore short sleeves (for violating fundamentalist customs),” Adina added.

Shi Guanzheng, a retired teacher originally from Shanghai, dared not venture too far despite the heavy security presence.

Shi blamed the government for failing to quell protests by Han on Tuesday, when, armed with knives, clubs and bars, they thronged parts of the city demanding revenge against Uighurs.

“That should never have happened. It should have been nipped in the bud. The killings of innocent people is never justified, but now both sides are so filled with emotion that the repercussions will last a long time,” he said.

“I’m scared about what will happen when the (paramilitary) People’s Armed Police have to leave. It’s not about tomorrow or the next day. It’s about next month or after. What then?”

Xinjiang has long been a tightly controlled hotbed of ethnic tension, fostered by an economic gap between Uighurs and Han, government curbs on religion and culture and an influx of migrants who are now the majority in Urumqi.

PREPARED FOR TROUBLE

Overnight in a Uighur neighborhood near the main bazaar, residents prepared for trouble, readying themselves with clubs.

One middle-aged woman in a headscarf walked by carrying a machete and a carving knife mounted on a stick.

Down the road, a group of seven Uighur men built a barricade out of planks with broken shards of beer bottles in front.

“We’re protecting ourselves,” one of the men said.

Turkonate, a lean Uighur man in his 20s standing outside with several friends, said police were taking away young men who had any recent injuries, who could not produce any identification or did not have residence papers.

“They’re taking our people every day. I don’t know how this is going to end.”

In a display of ethnic unity, state television showed Shanghai Communist Party boss Yu Zhengsheng and mayor Han Zheng visiting Uighur restaurants in the commercial hub of the country’s financial capital.

“If there is no stability or harmony, the lives of the people cannot get better and there will be no economic development,” Yu was quoted as telling his Uighur hosts.

The government has blamed Sunday’s killings on exiled Uighurs seeking independence, especially Rebiya Kadeer, an activist who lives in exile in the United States. Kadeer has denied the accusations. (Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard in Shanghai and Yu Le, Lucy Hornby and Benjamin Kang Lim in Beijing; Editing by Nick Macfie) – Reuters