http://olympics.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=worldNews&storyID=7097346<snip>
MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - Insurgents attempted to overrun two police stations in the northern city of Mosul but were repelled by Iraqi police and National Guards, the U.S. military said Wednesday.
Tuesday's attack came little more than a month after gunmen stormed a dozen police stations in the city and looted, burned or blew them up in a coordinated set of attacks. Around 80 percent of Mosul's police fled in the face of those attacks.
In Tuesday's assault, men with rifles and pistols attacked two stations, one in the east of the city the other in the west, in what appeared a coordinated effort, the U.S. military said.
"The Iraqi police and soldiers from the Iraqi National Guard successfully repelled the attacks preventing a reoccurrence of the events of Nov. 10 when many police stations were abandoned and later looted," a U.S. statement said.
"This is the third and fourth time since Nov. 10 where insurgents have tried but failed to take police stations proving that the Iraqi security forces are growing stronger each day."
Despite the successes, Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, essentially remains without a working police force, a factor Major General Carter Ham, the commander of U.S. forces in the area, has said could compromise security for Jan. 30 elections.