The 9th South Asian Federation Games, scheduled to begin in Islamabad on March 29, have been cancelled due to the war in Iraq, according to an official announcement on Saturday.

This is the third time that the jinxed games have been cancelled. Scheduled for 2001, they were postponed due to the September 11 terrorist strikes on the United States and again later due to Indo-Pak tensions.

India had already pulled out of the regional competition citing security reasons.