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JAMES MURDOCH HAS announced this afternoon that he is stepping down from the boards of The Times, Sunday Times and The Sun.

The London Evening Standard quotes a spokesperson as saying that Murdoch was not “walking away from the UK newspaper arm” of the business and would remain chairman. He was promoted to the position of News Corp deputy chief operating officer in New York earlier this year.

Murdoch will also remain a director of key holding company News International Group Limited and of Times Newspapers Holdings.

Tom Mockridge, who became News International’s chief executive after Rebekah Brooks resigned in July, is to take Murdoch’s place in the boards of News Group Newspapers Limited, which publishes The Sun, and also Times Newspapers Limited – which publishes The Times and Sunday Times.

Murdoch has come under intense pressure over the past number of months, when the full extent of illegal phone-hacking by the News of the World newspaper publicly came to light. He has recently appeared before the UK’s Culture, Media and Sport select committee along with other high-ranking figures in News International to give evidence on the matter.

The scandal has also prompted the current Leveson inquiry into press practices and ethics – watch here.

Read more about the phone-hacking scandal>

Read more about the Leveson inquiry>

Watch live: Celebrities give evidence at the Leveson inquiry into media ethics>

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