Allies, Iraq Negotiating Security for Key Kurdish City : Refugees: Baghdad has pulled back some troops from Dahuk, reducing tensions, U.S. Army says.

Coalition forces are negotiating a plan with the Iraqi military to let Kurds return to an Iraqi provincial capital without using U.S. ground troops to occupy the city, a U.S. military negotiator said Friday.

Talks over the future of Dahuk are a critical element in the success of Operation Provide Comfort, the allied program to save the Kurds.

The allied forces have sought control of Dahuk to encourage Kurdish refugees to return home. At the same time, allied officials have sought to avoid becoming embroiled in a new struggle with Iraq, which considers Dahuk of strategic importance.

The U.S. Army said Friday that Iraq has pulled some forces from Dahuk, reducing chances of a confrontation with allied soldiers who had planned to secure the city as part of the Kurdish relief effort.

Allied intelligence officers had said Iraq was toughening its position around the city, placing more than 1,000 soldiers on the surrounding hills.

However, Army Lt. Col. Lee Ryals, a spokesman at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey, said Friday that Iraq was withdrawing and that only about 100 soldiers remain in the city and immediate vicinity.

Dahuk, which had a predominantly Kurdish population of about 380,000, would be a magnet to returning refugees if the allies could convince them that it is safe. About 5% of the original population is believed to remain in Dahuk following the failed Kurdish uprising against Saddam.

“There are a lot of ways we can provide security without going into the city,” U.S. Army Col. Dick Naab, leader of the allied negotiating team, told a news conference in the Turkish border town of Silopi.

Naab said the allies and the Iraqis traded suggestions about the future of Dahuk, 35 miles south of Iraq’s border with Turkey. He said he expects a response from Iraq’s chief delegate, Brig. Gen. Nushwan Danoun, at their daily meeting today.

Meanwhile, the allied-run refugee camp in Zakhu reached its capacity of about 20,000 people. About 75% of the inhabitants are from Dahuk area, according to Lt. Col. Bob Christophersen, commander of the U.S. Army’s 432nd Civil Affairs Company, which runs the camp.

The 432nd on Friday opened another camp about a mile away, and Christophersen said most of its inhabitants will also be from around Dahuk. He said the second camp also could house up to 20,000.