Chief international correspondent leaving cable network after more than 25 years to anchor Sunday show on ABC

This article is more than 10 years old

This article is more than 10 years old

Christiane Amanpour, CNN's chief international correspondent, is leaving after almost 30 years to become the new anchor at rival US TV network ABC.

One of CNN's best-known correspondents over the past two decades, Amanpour is leaving Time Warner's cable news channel to host This Week, the Sunday morning news programme on ABC News. She will leave CNN next month and start work for ABC in August.

Amanpour joined CNN in 1983 as a foreign desk assistant. Her decision to leave comes just six months after she stepped back from her role as a foreign correspondent to launch her own interview show, called Amanpour, on CNN International.

Memorable moments from her career include covering the first gulf war in 1991, the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s, the Iraq invasion in 2003 and the current conflict in Afghanistan.

"I leave CNN with the utmost respect, love and admiration for the company and everyone who works here," said Amanpour. "This has been my family and shared endeavour for the past 27 years and I am forever grateful and proud of all that we have accomplished."

At ABC Amanpour replaces George Stephanopoulos, the former Clinton administration communication director who became the new anchor of Good Morning America in December. ABC News's senior White House correspondent Jake Tapper will be the interim anchor of This Week until Amanpour starts.

This Week competes with Face the Nation on CBS, Meet the Press on NBC and Fox News Sunday.

"With Christiane we have the opportunity to provide our audiences with something different on Sunday mornings," said David Westin, president of ABC News. "We will continue to provide the best in interviews and analysis about domestic politics and policies. But now we will add to that an international perspective. Christiane will bring the international and the domestic together, in the interviews she does and in the roundtable over which she presides."

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