It's over: Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony announce shock split after seven years of marriage انفصال جينيفر لوبيز عن زوجها

Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony have split after seven years together.

The couple, who are parents to three-year-old twins Max and Emme, made the shock announcement in a joint statement this afternoon.

 

'We have decided to end our marriage,' they said

'This was a very difficult decision. We have come to an amicable conclusion on all matters.'

'It is a painful time for all involved and we appreciate the respect of our privacy at this time.'

The split comes as a surprise to fans given the pair's recent and quite public displays of affection.

 

They were last pictured together at the unveiling of her Boy's and Girl's Club billboard in Times Square in New York on June 10.

However, Anthony was notably absent at the BAFTA Brits to Watch party in Los Angeles on on Saturday night.

Lopez instead took her mother Guadalupe to meet Prince William and Duchess Kate.

During their marriage, the pair mixed business with pleasure.

They starred together in 2005's El Cantante, a film about salsa king Hector Lavoe.

That same year, they also collaborated on Lopez's first full-length Spanish language album, Como Ama Una Mujer (How a Woman Loves).

 

The took their love on the road as they teamed up for a tour in 2007. In November that year, Lopez announced she was pregnant.

She described having her twins with Anthony as a life altering experience.

She told Ellen DeGeneres in January: 'As soon as I had the babies, I thought to myself, "I want to do this a thousand more times". I love this. This is life.'

Lopez and Anthony began dating just three weeks after her very high profile engagement to Ben Affleck was called off in January 2004.

 

In June that same year, they said 'I do' in a secret ceremony at her lavish Beverly Hills home.

At the time of their marriage, the ink was still drying from Anthony's divorce from first wife, former Miss Universe Dayanara Torre.

The pair renewed their wedding in 2008 and again last year as they celebrated their sixth anniversary. 

Lopez had been married twice before to restaurateur Ojani Noa, whom she split from in 1998, and former backup dancer Cris Judd, to whom she was married from 2001 to 2003.

Anthony has two sons Cristin, 10, and Ryan, 7, from his first marriage to Torres. He also has a teen daughter, Arianna, from a previous relationship.