KARACHI, (Reuters) – Pakistan’s legal challenge  against the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) decision to  move the 2011 World Cup matches out of the country due to  security reasons was rejected by the governing body yesterday.

In a statement the ICC said its executive board had not  removed the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) as a joint host but had  simply decided to stage the matches outside Pakistan.

Pakistan had been scheduled to stage the event with India,  Sri Lanka and Bangladesh but the ICC opted to redistribute the  matches among the other three host nations after gunmen attacked  the Sri Lankan cricket team bus on March 3 in Lahore, wounding  six players and their assistant coach. Six policemen and a van  driver were killed.