Nadav Neuhaus

Photo:Nadav Neuhaus.Turkey\Diyarbakir.For the villagers drafted into Turkey's so-called Rural Guard, service is a double-edged sword. These local Kurdish fighters struggle with a trying question of loyalty, having pledged their services to the Turkish military in the name of defending their villages and towns against attacks by rebel fighters during the nearly two-decade war with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) - now known as KADEK. But in Turkey's Kurdish heartland, where the PKK's call for Kurdish rights and an independent Kurdistan enjoys widespread support, allegiance to the reviled military is a traitor's choice..During the bloody war that brought some 20 years of martial law to southeastern Turkey, the Rural Guard were the flip side of the PKK - mercenaries without a mercenaries salary. Signing up was an abrupt affair - without military training or a guarantee of job security, but it was only nominally voluntary. Following the unilateral ceasefire declared by jailed PKK leader Abdullah ?calan in 1999, the conflict has subsided, leaving the guard in an even more precarious position. With sparse activity from KADEK in the region, a local extension of the military has become redundant, yet few guarders covet release, fearing life without the protection provided by their guns..With war on Turkey's borders, however, years of quiet could be shattered. Fearful that the power vacuum in Iraq could spur a renewal of calls in northern Iraq for an independent Kurdistan, the Turkish military has massed some 100,000 troops at the border. With a troop deployment looking increasingly likely, the military's fears may be a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the rural guard could see their service needed again. ....