At least six people were killed and dozens wounded in a string of explosions targeting education institutions in the Afghan capital.

At least two explosions struck pupils as they left the Abdul Rashid Shahid boy’s school and then another blast struck the Mumtaz Education Centre in the same neighbourhood.

Both attacks happened in a west Kabul neighbourhood known for housing members of the country’s Shia Hazara ethnic minority which has been repeatedly attacked by Islamic State group.

Witnesses to the boys school bombing said the first blast struck as pupils were leaving classes, then a second went off as rescuers were trying to evacuate the wounded.

The majority of dead and wounded were thought to be teenage schoolboys aged 15 to 18. Pictures from the scene showed several young men dead or grievously wounded, and piles of bloodied and abandoned school books.

“We were leaving school and had just stepped out from the rear gate when the explosion occurred,” Ali Jan, a student who was wounded in the first blast, told AFP at a hospital in the area where the blasts occurred.

The second blast took place as rescuers arrived to ferry victims from the first explosion to hospitals.

“Some of our friends have lost hands, while some were covered in blood,” said Saeed Rahmatullah Haidari, a student at the school.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which followed a lull in violence over the cold winter months and after foreign forces withdrew last year.

The blasts struck the Dasht-e-Barchi area where schools and colleges have been repeatedly targeted in recent years, particularly by the Islamic State militant group.

Dasht-e-Barchi was bombed several times in the closing years of the internationally-backed Afghan government. In one of the most notorious attacks at least 90 people, mainly schoolgirls aged 11 to 15 were killed by bombs outside the Sayed al-Shuhada school in May 2021.

After the Taliban takeover, Islamic State group has continued to wage a bombing and assassination campaign against both Shia Afghans and Taliban fighters.

Vicki Aken, Afghanistan director of the IRC aid group said the charity was , said: “Such attacks are a shocking indictment of the jeopardy that Afghan civilians are currently living in.  The steady increase in attacks against schools and educational institutions must end. Civilians – especially children – must never be a target and the world must see an end to this violence.”