PANJWAII DISTRICT, Afghanistan — Canadian soldiers took a suspicious man in for questioning Wednesday after a five-hour foot patrol through villages and fields where local farmers complained about being fired upon while tending to their crops at night.

The encounters highlighted the often difficult task of telling friend from foe in a war in which insurgents easily blend in with the locals who eke out a living from the verdant grape and wheat fields that surround the isolated patrol base of Sperwan Ghar.

The man, who just happened to cross the path of patrolling soldiers, could not explain what he was doing in the area of southern Afghanistan where Taliban rebels frequently deploy improvised explosive devices.

Last week, for example, Canadian forces in the area neutralized a "daisy chain" -- a series of connected explosives laid over a distance of almost 90 metres, enough to have destroyed an entire foot patrol had it been detonated.

Despite his insistence he had been unemployed for nine years, the 43-year-old man was carrying a small quantity of Pakistani money. He also tested positive for fertilizer residue, which is sometimes used to manufacture explosives.

The soldiers also questioned an eight-year-old boy carrying a small yellow-handled scythe, who burst into tears, and his 10-year-old cousin, who had been working the fields near where the man was walking.

While the presence of children is usually taken by soldiers as a sign there's no immediate danger, youngsters are often used by the Taliban as scouts. However, neither boy said he knew the man being questioned, nor had they been asked to report on the soldiers' movements.

Eventually, they were allowed to scurry home, each clutching a small sweet given them by one of the soldiers.

The patrols, which ramble daily through Panjwaii's pastoral landscape, can quickly become tense, painstaking affairs as soldiers stop to check culverts and any of the myriad other places explosives can be hidden.

The tell-tale boom of a blast at some distance or the odd warning shot fired by one of the soldiers -- as happened Wednesday -- serve as constant reminders of the insurgent threat.

A short distance from where the man was questioned, two farmers button-holed the soldiers to complain about getting shot at by coalition forces at the patrol base while they worked their fields.

"If it doesn't stop," one man said, "We will have to leave this area."

After ascertaining from them the gunfire had occurred the previous evening, Sgt. Philippe Dessureault pointed out that Canadian soldiers had not discharged their guns at that time. The firing most likely came from twitchy Afghan National Army soldiers, a popular target for insurgents.

Nonetheless, there were signs that rumours have been spreading of Canadian soldiers firing on civilians. Two days earlier, two teens made similar complaints during a foot patrol in a different village.

"One of the farmers was working in the garden and one of your members was shooting at him and now he is murdered," one teen said though an interpreter.

"We do not shoot Afghan villagers," Dessureault explained to the dubious youth. "We are here to protect you and to help you."

"One day, our mullah was faced with you people and he was scared from that and his body was shaking," the youth said.

Dessureault later said he believed the teen was referring to an incident in which troops shot a man using a walkie-talkie to relay Canadian troop movements to insurgents.

Still, squelching the stubborn rumours that thrive in the dust of the asymmetrical war is difficult.

"You can hear a lot of stories about Canadians being bad guys," the sergeant explained to another teen who expressed similar fears about Canadian soldiers.

"I'm not going to tell you take our side -- you're smart, and in the future, you can choose your own side."

The Canadians did receive a warm welcome Wednesday in a small general store filled with a dizzying array of colourful items, from Bazooka chewing gum and other sweet treats to cigarettes, rice, sugar and a poster sporting the faces of those who had died at the hands of the occupying Soviets two decades ago.

Over hot tea, two storekeepers praised the Canadians.

"You are a good army -- not like the Afghan National Army because three kids are dead (at their hands)," one told Dessureault.

If the Afghan soldiers didn't stop their shooting, they, too, said they would have to leave the area.

Dessureault promised to take up their complaint.

One of them also said Taliban used the area to stage attacks, but would then run away, adding the insurgents did not live in the village.

The man brought in for questioning was later released after military brass concluded there was insufficient evidence to detain him.