How experts will analyse Arafat's remains

One of the Middle East's greatest political mysteries will come a step closer to being solved when scientists exhume iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's remains to see if he was poisoned.

Experts from Switzerland, France and Russia will take part in the exhumation of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to determine if he was poisoned.

Rumours and speculation have surrounded Arafat's death since a quick deterioration of his condition saw his passing at the Percy military hospital in November 2004 at the age of 75.

French doctors were unable to say what killed the Palestinians' first democratically elected president and an autopsy was never performed despite his wife's request.

But many Palestinians believed he was poisoned by Israel -- a theory that gained ground in July when Al-Jazeera reported abnormal quantities of the radioactive substance polonium had been found on Arafat's clothes.