Yasser Arafat 'may have been killed by polonium'

Former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat may have been killed by radioactive polonium, tests on his body have reportedly revealed.

A Swiss team asked to examine samples taken from his corpse when his grave was exhumed last November allegedly said their tests "moderately support" claims he was poisoned with polonium-210.

The scientists are from the Vaudois University Hospital Centre (CHUV) in Lausanne, Switzerland. Arafat’s official medical records say he died in 2004 at a military hospital in Paris after he was taken ill the previous month with diarrhoea and vomiting.

Doctors said he had suffered a massive stroke, although they were unable to find the origin of his illness.

French prosecutors opened a murder investigation in August 2012, after traces of polonium-210 - the same radioactive substance that killed Russian spy Alexander Litvinkenko in 2006 - were reportedly found on some of Arafat's belongings.

Many Palestinians and others have long believed that Israel poisoned Arafat.

Others allege that he had Aids or cancer.

Israel however has consistently denied any involvement.