Baghdad - Iraqi police on Tuesday arrested suspected perpetrators of a restaurant bomb attack in Kirkuk that left 45 dead and 85 injured including many women and children.

The attack took place earlier in December in a restaurant during the Muslim feast of sacrifice, Eid al-Adha, earlier in December, and was the work of a suicide bomber, police said at the time.

Kurdish security forces with the help of US forces arrested members of an Islamist extremist group, that claimed responsibility for the attack.

Police also confiscated 250 kilos of TNT and bombs.

A security source in Kirkuk denied the involvement by Kurds or Turkmans in the attack. Rumors of Kurdish and Turkman involvement in the outrage harmed relations between the groups, the source said.

Kirkuk is a multi-ethnic city with a population of Kurds, Arabs and Turkmans located near Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region. (dpa)