NATION IN BRIEF

Dust, Gases Got Into Surviving Miner's Lungs

PITTSBURGH -- Rescuers who found the lone survivor of this week's accident in a West Virginia coal mine may have reached him just in time, because his lungs were starting to fill up with dust and gases, one of his doctors said Friday.

In the hour before he was discovered, Randal McCloy Jr. lost the ability to cough, sneeze or otherwise control his airway, Richard Shannon said.

The dust and low-lying gases that settled in McCloy's lungs as he lay on his side caused inflammation in his left lung, Shannon said, adding that stabilizing the inflammation will be important for getting the miner off a ventilator. McCloy is in critical condition in a medically induced coma with brain damage and other injuries from oxygen deprivation.

As the victims' families made plans for the first of the funerals in West Virginia, officials worked to purge the Sago Mine of poisonous gases and allow investigators to determine what sparked the explosion.

* * *

MIAMI -- Jose Padilla, charged with supporting terrorism, returned to court a day after his transfer from military to civilian custody, but a judge agreed to postpone hearing his plea and deciding whether he should be granted bail. Padilla's attorneys had asked for the delay, and U.S. Magistrate Judge Barry Garber set a new hearing for Jan. 12. Padilla is accused of being part of a North American terrorist support cell seeking to provide money, material and fighters for violent Islamic extremists around the world.

NEW YORK -- South Korean lobbyist Tongsun Park was arrested in connection with the United Nations oil-for-food program for Iraq. Prosecutors alleged he conspired to aid Saddam Hussein's former Iraq government. Last year, he was charged with being an unregistered agent for Iraq. Park was at the center of a 1970s bribery scandal in Washington.

SAN DIEGO -- A federal grand jury indicted five current and former San Diego pension fund officials on 20 counts of fraud and conspiracy in an investigation of the city's troubled finances. A 2002 vote that allowed San Diego to escape payments to the retirement fund while increasing pension benefits and a similar move in 1996 were largely to blame for a $1.37 billion pension deficit.