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Iraq's Mosul back under control, US general says

Nov-14-2004 » Filed Under: 1/25 SBCT

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BAGHDAD, Nov 14 (Reuters) The US general in charge of Mosul says the northern Iraqi city is back under US and Iraqi control, but admits a two-day insurgent rampage last week caused alarm and stretched security forces.

Groups of up to 50 armed men ran amok through Iraq's third largest city on Wednesday and Thursday, attacking police stations, looting them of weapons, bullet-proof vests and vehicles, and setting them ablaze.

Scores of policemen deserted, allowing at least nine of Mosul's 33 police bases to fall temporarily into rebel hands.

''I wouldn't say that we were close to the precipice ... but it was alarming,'' Brigadier General Carter Ham, the commander of Task Force Olympia, told Reuters late yesterday.

''The claims that Mosul was out of control were vastly overstated. But I am concerned about the security situation.

''I'm certain that the problems aren't over yet,'' he said, speaking by telephone from his base in the city, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, on the banks of the Tigris river....

Ham said he had expected a step up in insurgency in Mosul once the Falluja operation got under way six days ago, but did not believe rebels who fled that city had come to Mosul.


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