London: Rebekah Brooks, the embattled chief executive of Rupert Murdoch's British operations, quit today, after days of mounting pressure over the phone-hacking scandal involving the group's once best selling tabloid News of the World.
Brooks was now the chief executive of News International, which owned four newspaper titles in Britain: The Sun, The Times, The Sunday Times and the closed News of the World, and it was under her editorship that dubious news-gathering practices took place. Brooks, 43, became the target of public ire when it was revealed that the people whose phones were hacked for
information included the murdered teenager Milly Dowler, and families of July 7 London bombing victims and kin of soldiers
killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Until today, Murdoch, 80, backed Brooks and refused to ask her to take responsibility for the illegal practices and resign, despite demands by Prime Minister David Cameron and others.
The phone-hacking row has already led to at least two major casualties so far: the closure of News of the World and the withdrawal of the USD 15 billion takeover bid for BSkyB. There are reports that Murdoch's companies now face
probes in the US and Australia. Brooks, a British citizen, will appear before the Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) Committee of the House of Commons on Tuesday. In an earlier hearing, she had admitted to MPs thather company had paid policemen for information.
Brooks was now the chief executive of News International, which owned four newspaper titles in Britain: The Sun, The Times, The Sunday Times and the closed News of the World, and it was under her editorship that dubious news-gathering practices took place. Brooks, 43, became the target of public ire when it was revealed that the people whose phones were hacked for
information included the murdered teenager Milly Dowler, and families of July 7 London bombing victims and kin of soldiers
killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Until today, Murdoch, 80, backed Brooks and refused to ask her to take responsibility for the illegal practices and resign, despite demands by Prime Minister David Cameron and others.
The phone-hacking row has already led to at least two major casualties so far: the closure of News of the World and the withdrawal of the USD 15 billion takeover bid for BSkyB. There are reports that Murdoch's companies now face
probes in the US and Australia. Brooks, a British citizen, will appear before the Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) Committee of the House of Commons on Tuesday. In an earlier hearing, she had admitted to MPs thather company had paid policemen for information.
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