A French military hospital spokesman said on Thursday afternoon that Palestinian president Yasser Arafat's medical state was complex, and that he was alive. "Mr. Arafat is not dead," Christian Estripeau, a spokesman for the Percy Military Training Hospital in Clamart outside Paris, said in a brief statement.
"The clinical situation following the first days after (Arafat's) admission has become more complicated. The state of health of the patient requires appropriate treatment which necessitated his transfer during the afternoon of Wednesday, November 3, to a unit suitable for his condition," Estripeau said.
Earlier, Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker said Thursday that Arafat died in hospital. "(He) passed away 15 minutes ago," Juncker told reporters on arrival at a European Union summit in Brussels. Juncker later retracted his statement.
His comments came after French officials and a French radio station, Radio Monte Carlo, reported the Palestinian leader's death. Radio Monte Carlo reported earlier that Arafat was clinically dead.
The reports were denied by top Palestinian officials, including prime minsiter Ahmed Qurei and senior adviser Mohammed Rashid.
A source quoted on French television said that Arafat is breathing with the help of a respirator and is not responding to medical treatment that is being administered.
All the day long there were indications about Arafat's serious condition. The Palestinian president has been in intensive since Wednesday after his condition took a sudden turn for the worse, Palestinian officials said. Some Palestinian sources were quoted by international news outlets that Arafat has lapsed into a coma, but two Arafat aides, for their part, denied he was in a coma.
Cabinet minister Saeb Erekat called the reports on the coma as "baseless." Erekat told The Associated Press that Arafat's wife, Suha, told him Arafat's condition was "stable but difficult."
Mohammed Rashid, Arafat's economic adviser, also denied that reports that Arafat had slipped into a coma.
Officials, speaking to The AP, said the Palestinian president's condition had seriously deteriorated Wednesday night and he was rushed into intensive care at the French military hospital where he has been undergoing treatment for nearly week.
Israeli media, citing Israeli intelligence repotrs, said Arafat suffered organ failure and that he had lost consciousness several times. The Tel Aviv-based Maariv daily said Arafat's condition was "very critical."
"These unfounded reports are not coming from French medical teams, these are leaks from the Israeli side," said Mohammed Dahlan, a former Palestinian security chief. "Leaking such rumors will only complicate things and also complicate the situation within the Palestinian public," he told reporters in Paris.
However, in another sign of Arafat's deteriorating situation, Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen), the former prime minister, Thursday morning canceled his planned trip to Paris to see Arafat. (albawaba.com)
