News International ex-CEO Rebekah Brooks arrested in phone hacking probe

Rebekah Brooks, the former chief executive of News International, on Sunday became the second top executive of Rupert Murdoch's embattled group, to be arrested in connection with the probe into the phone hacking and bribery scandal in Britain.

Brooks was arrested by the Scotland Yard team incharge of investigations around phone hacking and other unethical practices allegedly adopted by a paper of Murdoch's group.

She was arrested on suspicion of conspiring to intercept communications and on corruption allegations during her time as editor of the now closed News of the World, Britain's largest selling tabloid.

Brooks was the second former editor of the paper after Andy Coulson, to be arrested in connection with the widening probe that has already claimed the newspaper.

Coulson was among a number of people arrested last week in connection with the allegations surrounding the now closed News of the World, whose journalists are alleged to have paid bribes to policemen for exchange of information and for hacking into the phones of a number of people, including politicians, celebrities and family members of soldiers killed in the Iraq war.

The phone of murdered teenager Milly Dowler was also hacked during the time Brooks was the editor of the paper.

The 43-year-old, who resigned on Friday as CEO of the News International, was arrested by appointment by Operation Weeting police at a London police station, and is currently in custody, BBC reported.

This is the 10th arrest made by police investigating hacking allegations by the News of the World newspaper.

The current investigation is focusing on unethical practices in the News of the World, whose journalists are alleged to have paid bribes to policemen for exchange of information and for hacking into the phones of a number of people, including politicians, celebrities and family members of dead soldiers.

The phone of murdered teenager Milly Dowler was also hacked during the time Brooks was the editor of the paper.

News International placed another advert in a number of Sunday newspapers, declaring that there should be "no place to hide" from the police investigation into phone hacking.

Headed 'Putting right what's gone wrong', the advert states that the company will cooperate fully with the probe and pay "compensation for those affected" and that the organisation was "committed to change".

The advert came a day after the company printed apologies in national newspapers, for the wrongdoings and unethical practices adopted by journalists of the now closed News of the World.

Miliband demanded cross-party agreement on new media ownership laws that would cut Murdoch's current market share, arguing that he has "too much power over British public life".