Public perception of the village guards began to sour when some of them used their positions for personal gain, with the support of some officials. Increasingly, the guards were seen not as a security force but as an instrument of influence and power, especially when it became known that they were also implicated in illegal affairs. The Surec report summarized the situation: “According to the Interior Ministry, 4,804 village guards were prosecuted for committing crimes between 1985 and 2003. Of these, 2,376 were charged with assorted ordinary crimes, while 2,375 were accused of aiding the PKK and serving as its accomplices.”

Their opponents alleged that the guards were altering the social fabric of the region. A 2013 report by Surec Research Center titled “Provisional Village Guards and the Solution Process” said, “Although the village guard system was established as an element of the state’s security policy, those who joined the system used their guns for their personal interests. Because they had the backing of state security forces, they were able to impose themselves as the basic authority of their villages and the region.”

This paramilitary force was controversial from the outset. The PKK and its sympathizers accused the guards of treason, as most of them are Kurds , and accused the state of instigating bloodshed among Kurds. The state said the fact that a guard system was needed was proof that most Kurds were opposed to the PKK. The acrimonious debate never ceased. The PKK demanded that the system be abolished and that those involved be prosecuted. The village guards weren't particularly threatened by those demands; they were more worried about their future , asking what would happen to them once the Kurdish issue was solved.

Some are full-time government employees; others are on short-term contracts. The village guard system is based on a law passed in 1924 that was updated and applied in 1985 when the PKK attacks started.

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey — For travelers in southeast Turkey, it's common in rural areas to see men in uniform armed with AK-47 assault rifles. They take part in operations with security forces, guard government facilities and clash with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), but they are neither police nor soldiers. They're called “ village guards .”

In recent years the village guards system had been slowly withering away, but it made a comeback in July 2015 when clashes between Turkey and the PKK erupted on a large scale. The PKK has been hunting down village guards ever since, killing many. The latest such incident was Sept. 27 in Hakkari province, when a PKK attack killed three guards and wounded two as they were watching over highway construction equipment.

In a recent meeting that Minister of Interior Suleyman Soylu held with guard chiefs from 22 provinces, a decision was made to update the system and strengthen it. The group decided to form a Department of Village Guards in the ministry to address guards' problems, and to form "special teams" armed with heavy weapons to operate with soldiers.

Ziya Sozen, the president of the Anatolian Village Guards and Martyr Families Confederation, the largest professional association of village guards, is pleased with the decisions made.

“The people we are fighting against have advanced heavy weapons. Our guards are trying to defend themselves with 100 bullets and a Kalashnikov. Weapons and uniforms of the guards have to be modernized. We are losing too many people because of those shortages. The guard system is essential. If we want to continue with it then it has to be supported with appropriate personnel and social rights, weapons and equipment,” Sozen told Al-Monitor.

According to Sozen, the region is not under PKK domination today because of the guards.

“Army soldiers and police come for short assignments and leave. Our guards, however, sometimes live in the same neighborhoods, even in the same buildings with PKK militants. Many of our guards were assassinated during the solution process. In villages where there are no guards, the PKK people walk about freely, but they cannot enter villages where there are guards. If we didn’t have this system, we would have surrendered the east and southeast of Turkey to the PKK and its proxies 25 years ago,” he said.

Sozen said the guards really aren't worried about their future. “When the PKK is done with, our state will ensure our transition to society by employing us in public services.”

Mesut Yegen, a sociology professor at Istanbul Sehir University, doesn’t believe the village guard system has a meaningful role in solving the Kurdish issue. Yegen said the decision to reinforce and upgrade the system was made because the state couldn’t find an alternative.

“The guard system has not contributed anything to the solution of the Kurdish issue. We haven’t forgotten the experience of the 1990s. The village guards cannot end PKK violence. It is an instrument that should not be used because of the social problems it creates. It disrupted social relations wherever it appeared and led the way to a variety of problems. Sociologically speaking, it cannot produce anything positive except to provide some people with a regular salary,” Yegen told Al-Monitor.

Yegen thinks most of the guards are not true volunteers, and he doesn’t expect them to be active in clashes. He also has a warning: “When the Kurdish issue is solved, a serious review of the guards has to be made. These people who now have a steady, assured income may cause new social problems if they lose this income. One aspect of the problem is that it enables some people to abuse the state authority and dictate their will on others. If a solution is not found, clashes can continue to erupt even if there is an overall solution. These clashes will be perceived not as politically motivated but as personal conflicts. This could be problematic.”

Today there are 47,510 temporary and 21,800 permanent village guards employed by the state. The government plans to increase the number of temporary guards to 50,000.

A villager living between Lice and Hazro related his experience with the guards to Al-Monitor, saying, “We had thousands of acres of land here. We had a typical land conflict with another man. That man joined the guards and now we can’t go to our lands.”

The common sentiment in the region is that although guards may at times assist security sources because of their familiarity with the region, unless they are kept under control they will continue to plague the Kurds for years to come.