By Ben Farmer, Kabul



4:54PM BST 21 Oct 2012






Efforts to revive the scouting movement in Afghanistan have encountered fierce local hostility as extremists suspect the recruits are working as police or even spreading a form of Christianity.
















Mohammad Tamim Hamkar, a Scout leader in Kabul, said even a recent campfire sing-song had illustrated the difficulties Scouts must overcome.





"Last year we had a camp fire and we had a big problem with some local mullahs who thought it was some kind of Christian worship," he explained.





After the Scout movement was banned following the Communist coup in 1978, its name, Zarandoi in Pashto, was adopted by the police and is still used by many.





As a result the Scouts have found themselves widely regarded a branch of the police and such confusion is potentially dangerous in a country where the police are distrusted and regularly targeted by the Taliban.





"This is difficult for the young generation, they think scouts are the army, or police. We try to explain," said Mr Hamkar.







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He said that to add to the confusion, Scouts had occasionally also been mistaken for the neckerchief-wearing Komsomol, a Soviet youth organisation used to spread Communist teaching in Afghanistan during the 1980s.



"People have had very strange ideas about us," Mr Hamkar admitted.



Afghanistan has links to the very beginning of the Scouting story, with the movement's founder, Robert Baden-Powell, serving in the country in 1880 as a young lieutenant with the 13th Hussars.



Afghan scouting began in 1931 when The Boy Scouts' Association of Afghanistan was founded under King Nadir Shah.



A report in Jamboree magazine from April 1933 describes how the movement had "to a great extent, won the hearts of the youth of Afghanistan" and its ranks stood at 310 Scouts, with another 36 Cubs.



Cubs, Scouts and Guides attended jamborees across Asia and local Scout leaders were joined by volunteers from among the expats working in the country.



Mohammad Morad Moradi, now aged 70, still has a sheaf of yellowing certificates from Scout leader courses and jamborees he attended in the 1970s and remains keen to show his skills.



"In a desert, or in the thickest jungle, even in the middle of the night, I can find my direction," he told The Daily Telegraph after giving the Scout handshake.



But it has struggled to regain a following since the fall of the Taliban.



Parsa, an international charity, has begun training troops of boys and girls take off in Bamiyan and Ghor provinces and in orphanages in Kabul.



More than 121 leaders have been trained and its troops have more than 1,000 members. Like their international brethren they play games, learn first aid and field crafts, but a lack of security means hiking, camping and field trips are largely impossible.



Meetings are immediately familiar to anyone who has ever been a Scout and begin with a recital of the national anthem and Scout promise, before members play games or learn new skills.



"I like tying knots and making bridges," said 15-year-old Jafar Mirzai. "They are skills we can use practically."