RAMALLAH, Palestinian Territories: The remains of iconic Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat were exhumed on Tuesday and experts began taking samples to be tested for signs of poisoning, Palestinian sources said.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, they said that the process began at 5 a.m. in the presence of French, Swiss and Russian experts, and that samples were being collected from the remains.

For weeks now, Arafat’s grave in a mausoleum on the Muqataa presidential site, from which he once governed, has been hidden from view by blue tarpaulins and media are being kept away from the area.

The samples being collected are to be tested for the radioactive substance polonium as part of a new investigation into whether Arafat was poisoned, which comes eight years after his 2004 death in a French hospital.

The probe was prompted by an investigation carried out by the Al-Jazeera news channel, which commissioned a Swiss lab to test personal effects belonging to the late leader that were given to them by his wife Suha.

The tests revealed the presence of the toxic substance polonium and prompted calls for the exhumation of Arafat’s remains for new testing.