West Bank invitation to Swiss probing Arafat poisoning

Published on 09/08/2012 00:00

SWISS experts have been invited to the West Bank to test Yasser Arafat’s remains for possible poisoning, the chief investigator looking into the 2004 death of the Palestinian leader said yesterday.

The announcement followed weeks of uncertainty on the autopsy issue by Palestinian Authority officials. Their conflicting positions and hesitation triggered speculation they were trying to smother the probe.

Last month, Switzerland’s Institute of Radiation Physics said it had detected elevated levels of radioactive polonium-210 on stains on Arafat’s clothing, reviving suggestions he had been poisoned.

However, the lab said the findings were inconclusive and that only exhuming his remains could bring possible clarity. Lab officials also said polonium decays quickly and that an autopsy would need to be done within a few months at most. They also said they needed a formal invitation to proceed.

Arafat died in a French military hospital on 11 November 2004, a month after falling ill at his headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where he spent the last three years of his life under Israeli siege.