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CNN anchor Anderson Cooper is walking away from his second job at “60 Minutes” in the latest sign of upheaval at the storied news magazine.

Cooper said in a statement Monday he is leaving the CBS News program because he wants to spend more time with his two young children. He joined the program in 2007 while maintaining his role as prime-time anchor at CNN.

“Being a correspondent at ’60 Minutes’ has been one of the great honors of my career,” Cooper said. “I got to tell amazing stories, and work with some of the best producers, editors and camera crews in the business. For nearly 20 years, I’ve been able to balance jobs at CNN and CBS, but I have little kids now and I want to spend as much time with them as possible, while they want to spend time with me.”

Cooper’s departure could be the first of a number of changes for “60 Minutes” as Bari Weiss, who joined CBS News as editor-in-chief last October, is expected to substantially overhaul the prestigious news magazine.

Cooper, 58, was courted for the anchor role at “CBS Evening News” last year before the network parted ways with the anchor duo of Maurice DuBois and John Dickerson. Cooper signed a new deal with CNN instead, and CBS News gave the anchor job to Tony Doukopil.

This is a developing story.

Lahore, Pakistan – As funerals were held on Saturday for more than 30 people killed in a suicide bombing at a mosque in Islamabad, analysts warned the attack could be part of a broader attempt to inflame sectarian tensions in the country.

A suicide bomber struck the Khadija Tul Kubra Mosque, a Shia place of worship, in the Tarlai Kalan area of southeastern Islamabad during Friday prayers.

In a statement, the Islamabad administration said 169 people were transferred to hospitals after rescue teams reached the site.

Hours later, a splinter faction of the ISIL (ISIS) group in Pakistan claimed responsibility on its Telegram channel, releasing an image it said showed the attacker holding a gun, his face covered and eyes blurred.

Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said mosque security guards tried to intercept the suspect, who opened fire before detonating explosives among worshippers. He alleged the attacker had been travelling to and from Afghanistan.

Security officials on Saturday told Al Jazeera that several key arrests had been made, including close family members of the suicide bomber in Peshawar and Karachi. They did not clarify whether there was evidence of their involvement in the plot.

Capital under fire?

Islamabad had seen a relative lull in violence in past years, but things have changed in recent months. The bombing marked the second major attack in the federal capital since a suicide blast targeted a district court in November last year.

Abdul Sayed, a Sweden-based analyst on conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan, said ISIL’s Pakistan branch, referred to as ISPP, claimed responsibility for what appears to be its deadliest operation in the country since its formation in May 2019.

“Since its formation, ISPP has carried out approximately 100 attacks, more than two-thirds of which occurred in Balochistan. These attacks include three suicide bombings targeting Afghan Taliban members, police, and security forces in Balochistan,” Sayed, founder of the Oxus Watch research platform, told Al Jazeera.

Pakistan has witnessed a steady rise in violence from fighters over the past three years. Data released by the Pak Institute of Peace Studies for 2025 recorded 699 attacks nationwide, a 34 percent increase compared with the previous year.

Islamabad has repeatedly accused the Afghan Taliban, who returned to power in August 2021 following the withdrawal of United States forces, of providing a haven to armed groups that launch attacks inside Pakistan from Afghan soil.

The Afghan Taliban condemned Friday’s mosque bombing and have consistently denied sheltering anti-Pakistan fighters.

In October, this very issue ignited the deadliest border clashes between the two sides in years, which killed dozens of people and led to evacuations on both sides.

A United Nations report last year stated that the Afghan Taliban provides support to the Pakistan Taliban, or TTP, which has carried out multiple attacks across Pakistan.

The report also said the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) has ties with both the TTP and ISIL’s affiliate in Khorasan Province (ISKP), indicating a convergence of groups with distinct but intersecting agendas.

Just days ago, Pakistan’s military concluded a weeklong security operation in the restive southwestern Balochistan province, claiming the deaths of 216 fighters in targeted offensives.

A military statement on Thursday said it followed the province-wide attacks by the separatist BLA carried out to “destabilise the peace of Balochistan”.

Fahad Nabeel, who heads the Islamabad-based consultancy Geopolitical Insights, said Pakistan is likely to maintain its hardened stance towards Kabul, citing what he described as Afghanistan’s failure to act against anti-Pakistan fighter groups.

He added that officials would probably share preliminary findings of the investigation and point to a possible Afghan link.

“The upward trajectory of terrorist attacks witnessed last year is expected to continue this year. Serious efforts need to be made to identify networks of facilitators based in and around major urban centres, who are facilitating militant groups to carry out terrorist attacks,” Nabeel told Al Jazeera.

Sectarian fault lines

Manzar Zaidi, a Lahore-based security analyst, cautioned against equating the latest bombing with the district court attack last year.

“The last year’s attack was essentially a target on a state institution, whereas this one was plainly sectarian in nature, something that has certainly gone done in the recent times, and that is why I will urge caution against a knee-jerk reaction to conflate the two incidents,” he told Al Jazeera.

Shia make up more than 20 percent of Pakistan’s population of about 250 million. The country has experienced periodic bouts of sectarian violence, particularly in Kurram district in northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan.

Regional tensions have added to domestic anxieties.

Zaidi said armed groups in the region backed by Iran remain alert amid “the simmering geopolitical tensions”.

“For Pakistan, it really has to keep a close eye on how things develop in Kurram region, where things can get out of control and there could be a fallout. The region currently has an uneasy peace; that can easily be instabilised,” he said.

Kurram, a tribal district bordering Afghanistan, has a roughly equal Sunni and Shia population. It has long been a flashpoint for sectarian clashes and witnessed prolonged fighting last year.

Nabeel said a timely conclusion to the investigation could shape the government’s response and help prevent the attack from becoming a trigger for wider sectarian unrest.

“However, the possibility of low-intensity sectarian targeting in different parts of the country is likely,” he warned.

Sayed added that an examination of Pakistani nationals who joined ISIL and affiliated groups shows that many came from anti-Shia Sunni armed organisations.

“The role of these sectarian elements is therefore an important factor in understanding such attacks. Moreover, such attacks appear significant in facilitating further recruitment of anti-Shia Sunni extremists within Pakistan, thereby contributing to IS efforts to strengthen its networks in the country,” he said.

“I’m now fully focused on the league,” Rohl told the media just a few minutes after the final ball had been kicked in Portugal.

“We have a mission and for this, we have all our energy now.”

Perhaps it will end up being a blessing for the Rangers head coach. He is on a fantastic run domestically – winning his last seven – and the lack of European distraction might help them sharpen that focus.

Three of the next four games will truly test their credentials. First up, it’s Hibs at Easter Road on Sunday afternoon (14:00 GMT).

After games against dwindling Kilmarnock and Queen’s Park in the Scottish Cup it’s Motherwell at Fir Park on 11 February (20:00).

Four days later, they welcome Hearts to Ibrox – who have beaten them twice already this season. Three of the top five, two away from home. It’s a huge test of their credentials.

“We are now fully focused on 15 match days in the league and it helps us to have two normal weeks,” Rohl added. “It’s the first time we can really train and can be fresh.

“We did well with the rotation. The next two-and-a-half weeks we have big games ahead and we need everyone. Some players will come back, some trained today.

“We kept one coach in Glasgow with them to be as prepared as possible. On Sunday, we go again with full conviction.”

TOKYO — There is in George Bush, as in many successful politicians, an element that is always on stage, an element of the eternal campaigner who responds with the instinctive gesture, sometimes incongruous and sometimes just right.

And so it was in Tokyo, notwithstanding the dreary mood of a rainy February afternoon, the solemnity of the state funeral of Emperor Hirohito and, on top of all that, the worrisome political problems posed by his troubled nomination of John Tower to be secretary of defense. Incongruity and the perfect touch, moments apart.

The funeral for the emperor who had reigned in wartime Japan was not a simple rite. It was a precisely staged ceremony of official mourning. The name of the man it memorialized brought back from fading memory the atrocities of World War II.

Arriving at the U.S. Embassy after this affair of state, the formally attired President flashed a thumbs-up sign–the simple gesture in incongruous contrast to the somber tenor of the occasion.

Moments later, he tossed aside a prepared address, delivered an off-the-cuff speech to a crowd of Americans at the embassy, and then spied a cluster of youngsters in the group. That gave him an idea.

Singling out the personal aide who accompanies him throughout his day, whether in Washington, Tokyo, or points in between, Bush said, “Tim McBride’s a good photographer.” With that, the President invited the children to hand McBride their cameras. They obliged, and he posed with each of them for pictures, McBride snapping away as the brief visit was stretched out by 15 minutes.

“It was like a campaign stop,” said the senior White House official who recounted the story, satisfied with his boss’ spontaneous, crowd-pleasing gesture.

Bush’s presidential campaign was marked in its final months by its careful control of each week’s agenda. No matter how Michael S. Dukakis would attack, Bush steadfastly kept to his script, making sure that the focus remained wherever he shined his light. Thus, Willie Horton and the American flag became the enduring symbols of the autumn.

In the opening days of the Bush Administration, however, the light has occasionally flickered. Its beam has been cast with less certainty, as outside events have distracted public attention from the President’s message. And nowhere has that become more evident than here in Tokyo.

Bush was invited to Japan to attend the Hirohito funeral. He took advantage of the ceremony to schedule individual meetings with nearly two dozen other leaders from countries large and small, squeezing 17 into a 30-hour period.

Much as Bush threw open the doors of the White House on the morning after his inauguration to a symbolic sampling of the American populace, he opened the Spanish-style residence of the U.S. ambassador to a representation of the world leadership–prime ministers and presidents and even a king (Baudouin I of Belgium).

One after another, they arrived in the same room in which Gen. Douglas MacArthur received Hirohito in September, 1945, a month after the end of World War II.

And with time running out, the President arranged a dinner Friday with one more visitor to Tokyo–meeting King Juan Carlos I of Spain, in a hotel restaurant.

But it was the Tower- mondai , as the Tower problem is called here, that riveted the attention of the White House staff and most of the 80 or so American reporters who accompanied Bush to Tokyo when they woke up Friday morning to the news that the Senate Armed Services Committee was about to reject the nomination.

Those who struggled to keep track of the funeral on large television screens in the White House press room at the Okura Hotel were swimming upstream: The tide Friday was swelled by a torrent of stories bearing Tokyo datelines and they were all about Tower.

And what about the President’s daylong effort to review the issues of the day with such foreign leaders as Presidents Richard von Weizsaecker of West Germany, Corazon Aquino of the Philippines and Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan?

What about evolving East-West relations, Afghanistan and Iran, U.S. support for President Aquino? All became afterthoughts.

The White House took particular pains not to offend Japanese sensitivities on a day of mourning.

Tokyo had instructed dignitaries on proper funeral attire, down to the black handkerchief in the pocket of the rented morning coat Bush brought from Washington.

Communications went back and forth between Tokyo and Washington, for example, on one particular point of concern: Barbara Bush’s request to wear her trademark triple string of fake pearls.

(Mrs. Bush’s identification with fake pearls has become so well known that it came as a surprise to some aides when she made a quick shopping stop after the funeral and purchased real Japanese pearls–a double-strand bracelet, with a silver clasp. Mrs. Bush herself was surprised when the jeweler refused to take a personal check. So she cashed her check–about $200–with U.S. Embassy personnel and paid in cash.)

The Japanese said pearls would not be suitable at the funeral. But after a time, this difficult decision was reversed. It seems that the pearls–artificial or otherwise–would be permissible, because pearls are, in the Japanese view, “the tears of the oyster.”

Times staff writer Betty Cuniberti contributed to this story.

DES MOINES, Iowa — President Trump is headed to Iowa on Tuesday as part of the White House’s midterm year pivot toward affordability, even as his administration remains mired in the fallout in Minneapolis over a second fatal shooting by federal immigration officers this month.

While in Iowa, the Republican president will make a stop at a local business and then deliver a speech on affordability, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said. The remarks will be at the Horizon Events Center in Clive, a suburb of Des Moines.

The trip is expected to also highlight energy policy, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said last week. It’s part of the White House’s strategy to have Trump travel out of Washington once a week ahead of the midterm elections to focus on affordability issues facing everyday Americans — an effort that keeps getting diverted by crisis.

The latest comes as the Trump administration is grappling with the weekend shooting death of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse killed by federal agents in the neighboring state of Minnesota. Pretti had participated in protests following the Jan. 7 killing of Renee Good by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Even as some top administration officials moved quickly to malign Pretti, the White House said Monday that Trump was waiting until an investigation into the shooting was complete.

Trump calls Pretti killing ‘sad situation’

As Trump left the White House on Tuesday to head to Iowa, he was repeatedly questioned by reporters about Pretti’s killing. Trump disputed language used by his own deputy chief of staff, Stephen Miller, who on social media described Pretti as an “assassin” who “tried to murder federal agents.” Vice President JD Vance shared the post.

Trump, when asked Tuesday if he believed Pretti was an assassin, said, “No.”

When asked if he thought Pretti’s killing was justified, Trump called it “a very sad situation” and said a “big investigation” was underway.

“I’m going to be watching over it, and I want a very honorable and honest investigation. I have to see it myself,” he said.

He also said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, who was quick to cast Pretti as a violent instigator, would not be resigning.

Republicans want to switch the subject to affordability

Trump was last in Iowa ahead of the July 4 holiday to kick off the United States’ upcoming 250th anniversary, which morphed largely into a celebration of his major spending and tax cut package hours after Congress had approved it.

Republicans are hoping that Trump’s visit to the state on Tuesday draws focus back to that tax bill, which will be a key part of their pitch as they ask voters to keep them in power in November.

“I invited President Trump back to Iowa to highlight the real progress we’ve made: delivering tax relief for working families, securing the border, and growing our economy,” Rep. Zach Nunn, R-Iowa, said in a statement in advance of his trip. “Now we’ve got to keep that momentum going and pass my affordable housing bill, deliver for Iowa’s energy producers, and bring down costs for working families.”

Trump’s affordability tour has taken him to Michigan, Pennsylvania and North Carolina as the White House tries to marshal the president’s political power to appeal to voters in key swing states.

But Trump’s penchant for going off-script has sometimes taken the focus off cost-of-living issues and his administration’s plans for how to combat it. In Mount Pocono, Pennsylvania, Trump insisted that inflation was no longer a problem and that Democrats were using the term affordability as a “hoax” to hurt him. At that event, Trump also griped that immigrants arriving to the U.S. from “filthy” countries got more attention than his pledges to fight inflation.

Competitive races in Iowa

Although it was a swing state just a little more than a decade ago, Iowa in recent years has been reliably Republican in national and statewide elections. Trump won Iowa by 13 percentage points in 2024 against Democrat Kamala Harris.

Still, two of Iowa’s four congressional districts have been among the most competitive in the country and are expected to be again in this year’s midterm elections. Trump already has endorsed Republican Reps. Nunn and Mariannette Miller-Meeks. Democrats, who landed three of Iowa’s four House seats in the 2018 midterm elections during Trump’s first term, see a prime opportunity to unseat Iowa incumbents.

This election will be the first since 1968 with open seats for both governor and U.S. senator at the top of the ticket after Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds and Republican U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst opted out of reelection bids. The political shake-ups have rippled throughout the state, with Republican Reps. Randy Feenstra and Ashley Hinson seeking new offices for governor and for U.S. senator, respectively.

Democrats hope Rob Sand, the lone Democrat in statewide office who is running for governor, will make the entire state more competitive with his appeal to moderate and conservative voters and his $13 million in cash on hand.

Kim and Fingerhut write for the Associated Press. Kim reported from Washington. AP writer Michelle L. Price in Washington contributed to this report.