More than 170 Iraqis were arrested Sunday for allegedly belonging to Saddam Hussein's now-outlawed Baath party, security sources told dpa, DPA reported.
More than 100 people were arrested in raids in the southern city of Kut, following orders from high-level officials in Baghdad, the sources said.
Forty former Baath party members and former army officers who worked during Saddam Hussein's rule were detained in Tikrit, 170 kilometres north of Baghdad.
In Baquba, north-east of Baghdad, 36 people were arrested.
The mass arrests come two days after Iraq and the United States agreed that all US troops will leave the country by the end of 2011.
The Iraqi government has blamed al-Qaeda-linked groups as well as Baathists for bombings and attacks in the country.
In 2009, hundreds of Baath party members were banned from running for parliamentary elections, until it was lifted a month before the March 2010 elections.
Talks between Washington and Baghdad on keeping some soldiers in the country longer failed over the Iraqi government's reluctance to grant legal immunity to troops who would have remained after December.
Less than 50,000 US soldiers are due to leave the country, under a 2008 agreement.
The withdrawal highlights the security challenges facing Iraqi security forces, as the near-daily bombings continue.
Meanwhile, a member of the parliament's Security and Defence Committee, Qassem al-Araji, told the government daily Al Sabah that six countries were chosen to provide the military with weapons.
"A team will be formed to visit these countries to know firsthand the arms they can offer to Iraq," al-Araji said, without naming the countries.
"The US troops are to blame for delay in arming the Iraqi army on different pretexts," added al-Araji.
The committee has suggested diversifying the arms suppliers. "We should not limit ourselves to one supplier, who can turn into a tool of pressure on Iraq in the future," said al-Araji.