The Arab League (AL) decided on Tuesday to set up an independent committee to probe the death of former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.
The committee will work with the Palestinian side and Arab and international bodies to reveal the details behind Arafat's death, according to a statement issued after a meeting of the pan-Arab body's permanent delegates.
The AL urged Palestinian investigators to provide all information available and other countries, especially France, to support the committee's work.
The committee's report will be completed within weeks and will then be referred to the next ministerial meeting of the AL. The report will be part of the AL's efforts to ask the United Nations to form a committee to probe Arafat's death, according to AL chief Nabil al-Arabi.
Arafat died at a military hospital near Paris on Nov. 11, 2004, three weeks after he was airlifted from his West Bank headquarters, where he spent two years under an Israeli siege.
Mahmoud Abbas, Arafat's successor, has ordered an investigation after Arab satellite channel al-Jazeera recently aired an investigative report concluding that Arafat was poisoned by radioactive polonium. The Palestinian leadership said it is ready to dig up Arafat's remains for the investigation.
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