Russian official rules out Arafat polonium poisoning
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The head of a Russian forensics agency said on Tuesday that samples from the body of Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat had revealed no traces of radioactive polonium, a Russian news agency reported. However, the government scientific body later denied that it had made any official statement about the research, saying only that it handed its results to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
If confirmed, the findings would deal a blow to Palestinian suspicions that Arafat was assassinated by Israel, a theory fuelled by a Swiss lab report last year which found unusual amounts of deadly isotope polonium on his clothes. (Reuters)
