London, July 15 (IANS) Amid increasing pressure from politicians and shareholders following a phone-hacking scandal, Rebekah Brooks, the embattled chief executive of Rupert Murdoch's British newspaper operations, Friday announced she had resigned, a media report said.

Brooks, the former Sun and News Of The World editor, announced in an internal email to staff at the company, which also publishes The Times and Sunday Times, that she was standing down.

In her email, Brooks wrote: "My desire to remain on the bridge has made me a focal point of the debate.

"This is now detracting attention from all our honest endeavours to fix the problems of the past.

"Therefore I have given Rupert and James Murdoch my resignation. While it has been a subject of discussion, this time my resignation has been accepted."

The 43-year-old Brooks said she quit to avoid distracting attention from News International's efforts to "fix the problems of the past", The Independent reported.

She became the focus of criticism of the company's journalistic practices after it emerged that the News Of The World hacked into murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler's phone while Brooks was editor of the Sunday tabloid.

Labour frontbencher Chris Bryant and a leading critic of the phone-hacking scandal, said Brooks should have left earlier.

"I think it is right that she goes. I think she should have gone a very long time ago," he told Sky News. "Frankly, she should have gone when she said she had paid police officers for information back in 2003."

The tabloid was shut down by owners News International July 10 following the phone- hacking scandal.