The widow of Yasser Arafat has given her approval for a Swiss radiation laboratory to examine the former Palestinian leader's body to see if he was poisoned, the news website swissinfo.ch reported on Friday.

Scientists at the Institute of Radiation Physics at the University of Lausanne have been ready to analyse Arafat's remains for two weeks now, but Suha Arafat's agreement only came in on Thursday.

The inquiry, which has also been requested by Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, comes after an investigation by al-Jazeera television last month that found "significant" traces of the radioactive material polonium-210 on some of Arafat's personal effects which were given to his widow after he died in 2004.

The 75-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner died in a military hospital near Paris on November 11, 2004, shortly after falling violently ill at his West Bank compound.

His widow and daughter launched a court case in France over the poisoning claims in July.