Mideast Violent scuffles erupted between Israeli settlers and security forces inside the main Gaza settlement as removal vans tried to reach houses of residents facing eviction. In Shirat Hayam, hardline settlers prepared for a showdown with Israeli forces by digging trenches and erecting barbed wire to thwart their eviction. Venezuela-Colombia A West Caribbean Airways plane crashed in western Venezuela with 152 people aboard leaving no survivors, the head of Colombia's civil aviation agency said. The head of Venezuela's civil protection agency said most of the victims were French. Japan A powerful earthquake off Japan's Pacific coast injured at least 56 people, set off small tsunami waves and swayed towering buildings in the heart of Tokyo. Afghanistan A NATO helicopter crashed in western Afghanistan, killing at least 17 Spanish peacekeeping troops on a training exercise for key parliamentary elections, the Spanish defense ministry said. Iran-US-Israel The new government of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ruled out any resumption of ties with the United States and said it would never have relations with Israel. Iran Iran's new hardline nuclear boss Ali Larijani vowed that Tehran would press on with nuclear fuel work as protestors formed a human chain at a uranium facility at the centre of its standoff with the West. Iraq Prime Minister Ibraham Jaafari sought to play down Iraq's failure to meet a deadline to draft a new constitution amid warnings of fresh political turmoil if it does not complete the charter next week. Greece Mystery deepened over the final moments of a Cypriot airliner that crashed in Greece killing 121 people as it emerged that an air hostess was in the cockpit at the moment of impact, possibly trying to gain control of the doomed plane. Vatican Hundreds of thousands of young Catholics gathered in Germany for the opening of the World Youth Day jamboree, ahead of the eargerly awaited arrival of Pope Benedict XVI. Britain Police have yet to establish a "direct linkage" between the July 7 bombings in London and the failed attempt on July 21 to repeat them, Britain's Home Secretary Charles Clarke said. Indonesia Indonesia's president pledged to honour a historic agreement with separatist rebels from tsunami-hit Aceh province, urging guerrillas to do the same, while troops were told to obey the pact but stay on alert. SriLanka Sri Lanka's president called for a month's extension of a state of emergency to give police and troops greater powers to hunt down the assassins of the country's foreign minister. Guatemala Rival gangs in Guatemala clashed with guns and grenades in a battle for control of four prisons, leaving at least 30 inmates dead and about 63 wounded, Interior Minister Carlos Vielmann said.