There was no claim of responsibility for the blast, which lightly injured the children's 45-year-old mother.
The bomb exploded at 10:40 p.m. (1940GMT) Sunday, in the capital's densely populated Patissia residential district. The blast instantly killed the youth. His sister was hospitalized with severe facial shrapnel wounds and burns, and doctors were trying to save her eyesight.
Surgeons removed metal fragments embedded in both the 10-year-old's eyes, and a hospital statement said further operations would be required, but the outlook was negative.
Police spokesman Athanasios Kokalakis said the motive and target of the attack were unclear, but the Afghan family, who lived nearby, had no connection with the bomb.
"On the contrary, they were the tragic victims of a blind act of violence," he said. "We are examining the explosives used and whether there was a timer. We can't say right now who was behind the bomb."
Small far-left and radical anarchist groups have claimed a string of bombings in recent years against symbols of wealth and state power, including banks and the Athens stock exchange. But nearly all have been preceded by warning calls, allowing police to evacuate the target areas. Sunday's death was the first since 1999, when a blast outside a hotel killed a conference worker.
Kokalakis said the bomb exploded in front of the Hellenic Management Association, a private not-for-profit organization.
"What appears likeliest is that the device had been left at the entrance to the building, the young man picked it up, felt it and it exploded in his hands," he said.
Police said they were investigating any link with a phone call warning of a bomb blast in the Patissia area early Sunday, which had given a garbled version of the management association's acronym.
Civil Protection Minister Michalis Chryssochoidis condemned what he called a despicable act of terrorism.
"These murderers see us all — police, immigrants, ordinary citizens — as enemies," he said. "We will find them soon."
Greek radical groups have escalated bomb and gunfire attacks over the past year and a half, shooting one policeman dead and injuring five more. Since September, authorities have arrested eight suspected members of a radical anarchist group called Conspiracy Nuclei of Fire, which claimed three Athens bombings this month.
The attacks, which caused no injuries, targeted the offices of an ultra right-wing party, a police immigration center and the home of a Pakistani immigrant leader whom the group accused of collaborating with authorities.
The group posted a statement on the Internet late Monday, claiming it had no connection with Monday's fatal bomb blast.
Separately Monday, a small gas-canister bomb damaged a church in the northern city of Thessaloniki, where police also defused similar devices outside a bank and a toy shop.
David Mikael Taclino
Inyu Web Development and Design
Creative Writer
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