The Scot who leads Kabul's quiet revolution

IN THE old city of Kabul an upheaval is under way - buildings are being rebuilt, streets are being cleaned and jobs created.

Men bustle around clearing away rubbish, which in places is 7ft deep; architects scribble plans feverishly and builders, covered in plaster dust, set about their jobs with a harried enthusiasm.

The revolution is being led by one man, 34-year-old Scot, Rory Stewart, from Perthshire.

Mr Stewart, educated at Eton and Oxford, is a man with almost as many tales as the bullet-scarred buildings that make up the area of Murad Khane.

Despite his young age, Stewart, who has an OBE, is more than up to the job.

A former British diplomat, he had one aim when he arrived back in Kabul in March last year: to save Murad Khane, part of the old city, and its unique architecture, from ruin. It was not Mr Stewart's first trip to Afghanistan...

In 2003 he walked across the country and wrote the best selling travelogue, The Places in Between. In between that and his return to Afghanistan, he was the Coalition Deputy Adviser to Maysan province in Iraq. His stint in Iraq led to his second book, The Prince of the Marshes: And other Occupational Hazards of a Year in Iraq.

Mr Stewart learned from his experiences in Iraq and was determined to implement a small, community-based project for which he had backing at the highest level.

"I went out on a limb," Mr Stewart told The Scotsman. "I was gambling a little that my plans would work. I was fed up with the hopelessness of Iraq and this seemed like a no-brainer.

"Afghans don't want workshops on gender issues, they want jobs and infrastructure."

Hong Kong-born Stewart is the son of Brian Stewart, a diplomat, and grew up partly in Malaysia.

His mother, Sally, an econo-mist and academic, once crossed Afghanistan's Hindu Kush herself, driving a jeep from London to Malaysia for a teaching position at the University of Malaya.

He started Turquoise Mountain Foundation, a charitable trust, with the Prince of Wales, whose children Stewart once tutored, and Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, as its patrons. "The project had three main aims," said Mr Stewart. "To restore the area of Murad Khane; to develop a centre for the arts; and to grow a business devel- opment."

Murad Khane, home to around 600 people, is the only area of old city remaining to the north of the Kabul River, but until recently it lived a perilous existence.

The buildings in the area do not date earlier than the late 18th century, with most structures being early 20th-century constructions. Their location within the surviving urban fabric and the style of construction, however, indicate much older patterns of occupation.

The charity Architects for Aid describes it as "an oasis of traditional architecture consisting largely of one-storey mud buildings, alongside a traditional Serai [a form of Muslim coach inn] and some of Kabul's best-known buildings - the minaret and shrine of Abu Feisal".

In 1975, under an East German master plan, it was earmarked for demolition. Since then, the area was considered "off the map," and no new services were installed.

That changed last Sunday when the Afghan government agreed to protect the area, due in no small part to Stewart's hard work.

"I'm delighted," said Mr Stewart, whose dedicated work has also seen the foundation expand rapidly.

In 2006 it had three employees; today it has more than 200, including dozens of expatriates.

To date, under his watchful eye, the foundation has cleared 4,500 cubic meters of rubbish, completed emergency repairs to 40 houses, built 12 household toilets, installed 200 meters of drainage, paved areas of the old city and rebuilt, in the traditional style, five shops.

A significant part of the plan was to breed goodwill in the community by providing work and improving the area. And judging by the smiles and handshakes that greet Mr Stewart as he walks through the windy streets of the old city, it seems to be working.

"Every unemployed male in the area who wants a job has one and every child is schooled by the foundation," said Stewart, in between swapping greetings, in Dari - the local language - with passing residents and workers.

As well as rebuilding and reinvigorating Murad Khane, Turquoise Mountain Foundation has also set up a school to train Afghans in traditional wood carving, calligraphy and pottery - traditions that all but died out during the years of civil war.

The ultimate aim is to move the school to Murad Khane and to attract tourists to the area.

"We have a long way to go, but the aim is to first attract the Afghan middle classes and then hopefully the internationals," said Mr Stewart.

NATO CHIEF'S PLEA TO MEMBERS

JAAP de Hoop Scheffer, the Secretary-General of NATO has said he is disappointed some members of the alliance will not send troops to fight Taleban guerrillas in the south of Afghanistan.

Speaking at a dinner in London on Wednesday, Mr de Hoop Scheffer said NATO members could show more solidarity and that he would "applaud" France if it ever decided to rejoin the alliance's integrated military structures which the country left in a dispute in 1966.

"I'm disappointed ... that not all the allies, and some major allies included, do not want to go to the places where the fighting is - although they also suffer from improvised explosive devices and suicide attacks," he said.

Britain provides much of the NATO force fighting the Taleban in the southern provinces of Afghanistan, alongside soldiers from Canada, the Netherlands and the United States.

Violence has surged in the past 19 months, the bloodiest period since American-led troops overthrew the Taleban government in 2001.

About 50,000 troops under the command of NATO and the United States are hunting Taleban rebels and their al-Qaeda allies.

Britain has been pressing other NATO members to send more soldiers to fight in the south. Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, called this week for other countries to share the burden.

"Yes, it is true that more nations could join the operations in the south. I say this with the greatest respect for all the 26 allies ... that are active in Afghanistan," Mr de Hoop Scheffer said.

He said the only long-term hope for Afghanistan was successful reconstruction and development, but that could take generations and a military presence there now was essential.

Losing the fight in Afghanistan would allow the Taleban and al-Qaeda to gain power and increase the chance of terrorist attacks in Western nations, he said.

"I do not see any serious alternative for the military presence of NATO forces under a UN mandate in Afghanistan."

Asked how important he believed it would be to bring France back into the NATO fold he said: "Very important".