No new findings over Arafat's death: official

RAMALLAH - A Palestinian official dismissed Sunday a British medical journal's report which linked Arafat's death with poisoning.

Tawfi Al-Tirawi, head of a Palestinian committee investigating Arafat's death, told Xinhua that the journal "brought nothing new, " noting it based its study on a 2012 investigative report by the pan-Arab news network Al-Jazeera.

"There are no leaks from the results and we are still waiting for the official test findings," said Al-Tirawi, adding there is no official time set for receiving the results.

British leading medical journal The Lancet published on Saturday a peer review of last year's research by Swiss scientists on Arafat's personal effects, endorsing the possibility that Arafat, the late Palestinian leader, was poisoned with the radioactive element polonium 210.

In 2012, Al-Jazeera's report suggested that Arafat, who died at a French hospital near Paris, was poisoned with polonium 210. Al- Jazeera used a Swiss lab to test Arafat's personal belongings, where traces of polonium were found.

Following the outcry triggered by Al-Jazeera's report, French, Swiss and Russian experts exhumed Arafat's body in November 2012 and took samples for more tests.