A driver was killed and 28 women were hurt as a factory bus, in which they were travelling in, plunged into a ditch after gunmen opened fire at them in Pakistan's Hassan Abdal city of the eastern Punjab province on Friday.

The unknown assailants attacked the bus when women laborers were on their way to the factory in the country's northwest Haripur district from Hassan Abdal early Friday morning, Muhammad Haider, an emergency official of the state-owned emergency rescue service Rescue 1122 in the city, told Xinhua.

The bus fell into a deep ditch when the driver of the vehicle lost control over it after sustaining gunshot injuries, killing him on the spot, the rescue official told the news agency, adding that the injured women have been transported to a nearby hospital for treatment in Hassan Abdal.

The police and rescue team immediately rushed to the spot after the incident.

The area was cordoned off.

The assailants managed to flee the scene after carrying out the attack, police told local media as quoted by Xinhua. (SAM