By NBC News staff and wire services
The remains of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat were exhumed from his grave on Tuesday -- eight years after his death at age 75 -- as part of an investigation into allegations that he was poisoned, according to official Palestinian radio.
The remains were taken from the massive mausoleum in the West Bank city of Ramallah, where Arafat was buried, and moved to a nearby mosque so that Palestinian doctors could take samples from his bones, Palestinian officials told The Associated Press.
The samples will be handed over to French, Swiss and Russian experts who have flown in for the exhumation and who will examine them in their home countries, the officials said. They said samples were taken earlier from Arafat's bedroom, office and personal belongings.?
French judges opened a murder inquiry into Arafat's death in August after a Swiss institute said it had discovered high levels of radioactive polonium on his clothing.
AP
See key moments and memorable scenes from Yasser Arafat's life.
A team of international experts from Switzerland, France and Russia was due to take samples from Arafat's body to test for traces of poison. The corpse will be reburied later in the day on Tuesday with full military honors.
Rumors of foul play have long surrounded the sudden demise of Arafat, a champion of Palestinian statehood from the time he was 19, and eventually, the democratically-elected president of the Palestinian Authority.
Arafat was revered by many Palestinians and Arabs as a freedom fighter and reviled by many Israelis and its allies as a terrorist for his relentless fight for Palestinian self-determination. But he also had enemies and rivals within the Arab and Palestinian political circles.
He died in November 2004 at a French military hospital, a month after suddenly falling ill. The rapid deterioration of his health and death baffled doctors who were trying to treat him in France, and an autopsy was never performed at the request of his widow, Suha.
While the immediate cause of death was a stroke, the underlying source of an illness he suffered in his final weeks has never been clear, leading to persistent speculation in the Arab world that Israel poisoned him. Israel has denied such allegations.
Poisoning as a cause of death gained currency after a Swiss institute said it had found high levels of radioactive polonium on Arafat?s clothing, which was supplied by Suha, prompting the French to open a formal murder inquiry.
Polonium was the substance that killed Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006. Litvenenko was a Russian ex-spy who later became a relentless critic of the Kremlin.
"It is a painful necessity" to exhume the body of Arafat, said Tawfiq al-Tirawi, who is in charge of the Palestinian committee overseeing the investigation, speaking to reporters in Ramallah on Saturday.
Tirawi said the Palestinians had "evidence which suggests Arafat was assassinated by Israelis," Reuters reported.
The exhumation might not resolve the mystery. Polonium-210 decomposes rapidly, and some experts say it is not clear whether any remaining samples will be sufficient for testing.
NBC's Kari Huus, Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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