Jakarta – The Indonesian capital, put on top security alert in anticipation of planned massive demonstrations against fuel price hikes, was essentially quiet Saturday except for a brief clash involving students calling for former president Suharto to be tried for corruption.

In the only case of violence reported for the day, some 200 students of the militant City Forum clashed briefly with anti- riot police near the residence of Suharto in an upmarket residential area in Central Jakarta.

At least five tear gas cannisters were fired after the protestors became violent and had begun to beat the police's shields with sticks and pelt them with stones.

Carrying posters and banners demanding Suharto's trial, the students could only approach a roundabout some 300 metres from the residence as about 100 police in anti-riot gears, mostly with shields and sticks, blocked their advance. There were no serious injuries reported and the students withdrew from the scene shortly after the clash.

Meanwhile at least 500 students and workers from the People's Justice Committee, protested peacefully at the empty parliament building, with just a couple of policemen on standby, mostly to guard against vandalism.

The Committee, a gathering of student, workers and rights groups, protested rises in electricity, tranport and telephone rates, an uneven increase in civil servant allowances and rejected a cut in education subsidies. By dusk, the protestors were still chanting march songs, interspersed with yells, on the massive external staircase of the parliament building.

Indonesian Police had put the capital under top alert status after student groups and non-governmental organizations threatened to mobilize thousands of people to protest the increase in fuel prices. But at the eleventh hour, Indonesian president Abdurrahman Wahid announced the government was postponing price increases.