Iraqi counter-terrorism squad has arrested up to 35 Iraqi Interior Ministry officials, including four generals, for plotting a coup to reinstate the Baath Party of former dictator Saddam Hussein [Images], a media report said on Thursday.

The arrests, confirmed by officials from the Ministries of the Interior and National Security as well as the Prime Minister's Office, included four generals, one of whom, Gen Ahmed Abu Raqeef, is the ministry's director of internal affairs, the New York Times said on Thursday.

The plotters were arrested over a period of three days by an elite counter-terrorism force reporting directly to the office of Nuri al-Maliki, the Prime Minister of Iraq, the Times said.

The involvement of the counter-terrorism unit speaks to the seriousness of the accusations, and several officials from the ministries of the Interior and National Security said that some of those arrested were in the early stages of planning a coup, the Times reported.

Some of those under arrest belonged to the now-illegal party under Hussein's government. Maliki's office declined to comment. But one of his advisers, on condition of anonymity, said the detainees were involved in a conspiracy.

Rumours of coups, conspiracies and new alliances abound in the Iraqi capital a month before provincial elections.

Security officials were reported as saying there was significant evidence tying those arrested to a wide array of political corruption charges, including affiliation with Al Awda, or the Return, a descendant of the Baath Party which was outlawed in 2003.

Officials from the Ministries of the Interior and National Security told the US daily those arrested were a mixture of Sunni and Shia Muslims.