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Radio Free Afghanistan journalist Abadullah Hananzai was furious on April 25 when he learned that a former colleague had been gunned down at a market in Kandahar in an apparent targeted killing.

"The murder of my former colleague at Kabul News, a great journalist named Abdul Manan Arghand, has greatly upset me," Hananzai wrote in Pashto on his Facebook page. "Arghand is now a martyr for freedom of speech."

It would be Hananzai's last public Facebook post.

Hananzai and Radio Free Afghanistan video producer Sabawoon Kakar were among multiple journalists killed in a suicide bombing in Kabul on April 30. The journalists were covering an earlier suicide attack when a second bomber, disguised as a reporter, approached them and detonated his explosives.

Maharram Durrani, a 28-year-old university student who was training to become a journalist at the Kabul bureau of RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan, was also killed.

Claimed by Islamic State militants, the blasts killed at least 25 and injured 45. The Afghan Journalists Center said that, with nine reporters killed, it marked the deadliest attack against journalists in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban regime in 2001.

Abadullah Hananzai

Hananzai was a video journalist who had been working since October 2016 on an antinarcotics project at RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan -- a project called Caravan Of Poison.

A graduate of Kabul University, Hananzai was 26 years old and was preparing to celebrate his first wedding anniversary on May 8.

He previously had worked for Kabul News and for Zhwandoon TV, as well as for the Educational and Cultural Center for Afghan Women.

Hananzai’s recent reports for RFE/RL focused on the social and economic implications of drug addiction in Afghanistan, as well as efforts by the Interior Ministry to crack down on international narcotics trafficking out of Afghanistan.

One of Hananzai's last Facebook posts was a message in English on April 19 and a photograph taken of himself in the compound of Radio Free Afghanistan's Kabul bureau shortly after a rainstorm.

"Feeling fantastic. I find Peace in the Rain," Hananzai said.

Sabawoon Kakar

Kakar was one of the first journalists to arrive at the scene of the first suicide bombing in Kabul on the morning of April 30.

He died from his injuries at a hospital in Kabul several hours after the second blast.

Kakar was a key member of Radio Free Afghanistan's video team over the past five years.

His work included feature stories about social issues in Afghanistan -- such as the status of women’s cricket in the country -- as well as news about counterterrorism operations and security issues.

Kakar's last video report was on April 29 -- a package he produced with RFE/RL reporters in the northern Afghan province of Baghlan about a battle between Afghan security forces and Taliban militants.

"He was often covering the aftermath of suicide attacks and other dangerous spot news situations," said Qadir Habib, a senior editor for Radio Free Afghanistan. "He was a brave man who was never afraid to cover dangerous stories."

On his Facebook page, Kakar declared that despite bombing attacks against voter registration centers in Kabul, he had registered and planned to vote in Afghanistan's October 20 parliamentary elections.

The 30-year-old Kakar, a native of Kabul, died one day before his fifth anniversary as an RFE/RL journalist. He is survived by his wife and a two-year-old son.

Maharram Durrani

Maharram Durrani was a third-year student of Islamic law at Kabul University who was just starting her career as a journalist.

Durrani was being trained to take part in the weekly woman's program RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan -- a job she was due to start on May 15.

She previously worked for an Afghan online music channel called Radio Salam Watandar.

"When I began working in media, one of my first bosses asked me why I was studying Islamic law but working in media," Durrani told RFE/RL during a February phone-in program.

"He said these are not related subjects. But I said, 'No, that’s not true’," Durrani explained. "It’s very much related because the media can provide information to all people."

KABUL -- A pair of coordinated suicide bombings claimed to have been carried out by the Islamic State (IS) militant group have rocked central Kabul near the country’s intelligence agency, killing at least 29 people, including two RFE/RL journalists and at least seven other media members.

Police said 45 wounded have also been taken to local hospitals in the April 30 attack, though they fear the number of casualties from the twin attacks may still rise.

Health Ministry officials said a suicide bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up in the Shash Darak area near buildings of the NDS intelligence service.

A second blast followed about 20 minutes later when a suicide bomber pretending to be a reporter blew himself up outside the headquarters of the Urban Development and Housing Ministry among the journalists covering the first explosion.

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Video and photographs from the scene show bodies strewn about streets littered with rubble as soldiers and onlookers rush to help the wounded, sirens from a stream of ambulances wailing in the background.

“The targeting of civilians, worshipers in mosques, national and democratic processes, journalists, and freedom of expression are concrete examples of war crimes. This terrorist act is in conflict with Islamic values and human rights,” President Ashraf Ghani said in a statement.

RFE/RL journalists Abadullah Hananzai was one of the nine media members killed in the second attack. AFP has identified Shah Marai, the chief photographer for the agency in Kabul, as another journalist killed in the blast.

Sabawoon Kakar, a journalist for RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan, died later in hospital from wounds suffered in the attack.

AP quoted Kabul police spokesman Hashmat Stanekzai as saying that four police officers were killed in the explosions.

In a statement issued via its Amaq news agency, IS claimed responsibility for the blasts targeting the headquarters of the "renegade" Afghan intelligence services in Kabul, which come days after the Taliban kicked off an offensive in an apparent rejection of calls for the militants to accept an offer by the Afghan government to hold peace talks.

“We condemn in the strongest terms possible the cowardly attacks in Kabul today by two suicide bombers that killed and injured Afghan forces and innocent Afghan citizens, including Afghan journalists,” General John Nicholson, commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, said in a statement.

“Make no mistake, the enemies of Afghanistan cannot win. Actions like this one only strengthen our steadfast commitment to the people of Afghanistan,” he added.

Kabul police chief Dawood Amin said the area near the attacks, which includes many foreign offices, has been sealed off and an investigation was under way.

The news agency dpa reported a separate blast in the southern part of the country that killed 11 children and injured 16 others, including Romanian soldiers.

A suicide bomber detonated himself while the convoy of foreign soldiers drove near a mosque, dpa reported, quoting a local police spokesperson. No claim of responsibility has been made for that attack.

Hananzai was a journalist and video cameraman who had been working on an antinarcotics project for RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan called “Caravan of Poison.”

The incident also comes about one week after a suicide blast killed 60 people and wounded at least 120 outside a voter-registration center in the capital.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the April 22 attack in Dashte Barchi, a heavily Shi'ite-populated area in western Kabul, also through Amaq.

The Sunni group has frequently targeted Afghanistan’s Shi'ite minority, which they view as “apostates.”

The government in Kabul is also battling Taliban militants, who were driven from power by the U.S.-led invasion 17 years ago.

Hundreds of people have died in several attacks in Kabul since the beginning of the year, despite the offer to the Taliban of peace talks "without preconditions" by President Ashraf Ghani.

With reporting by Reuters, AFP, Tolo News, dpa, and AP