A group of western tourists trekking through a remote jungle track in Papua New Guinea have been injured in a savage attack in which their guides were hacked to death.

The attack happened on the popular Black Cat trail, near the town of Wau in Marobe province, when the tour group was ambushed by bandits wielding machetes, knives and spears.

The Western tourists, believed to include eight Australians and a New Zealander, are understood to have sustained injuries that include cuts and minor head injuries.

The gang of six men that attacked the tourists on the Black Cat track has disappeared into the jungle and police are hunting them.

Trek leader Christie King, the only woman among the travellers, led some of the tourists through the bush to find assistance after the attack.

They are now said to be making their way back to the capital Port Moresby.

Stanley Komunt of the Morobe Mining Joint Venture project who co-ordinated the group’s rescue said that they initially thought that only one guide had been killed but found two bodies when they arrived at the scene of the attack.

It has not been established whether the attack was just to steal the tourists’ possessions – everything they had was taken by the bandits – or whether it was because a gang of locals objected to porters from another district bringing visitors to their area and benefiting from the tourist’s fees.

Shocked local villagers have banded together to hunt for the attackers.

All of the surviving porters have knife wounds, some of them serious.