Rupert Murdoch appoints two co-presidents to run Fox News after departure of Roger Ailes

Mr Murdoch had overseen the news operation on an interim basis

Fourteen years ago, Mr Murdoch was helping prepare public opinion on both sides of the Atlantic for the invasion of Iraq (Getty)

Rupert Murdoch has reportedly appointed two co-presidents to run Fox News and the Fox Business Network after the departure of founder and CEO Roger Ailes.

Reports said that the tycoon named Fox Stations CEO Jack Abernethy and Fox News senior executive VP of programming Bill Shine, to serve in a joint capacity after Mr Ailes stood down amid a probe into allegations of sexual harassment.

Mr Shine was reportedly long considered one of Mr Ailes’s potential successors, and his name had come up in reports about the network’s handling of the workplace harassment allegations.

Following Mr Ailes’s departure last month amid a series of sexual harassment allegations, which he had denied, Mr Murdoch took over the newsroom as an interim solution until naming Mr Shine and Mr Abernethy as immediate replacements. Mr Murdoch will remain as executive chairman.

Fox announced the new leadership structure on Friday, three weeks after Mr Ailes, the founding CEO and chairman, resigned under pressure.

Mr Ailes has been accused of sexual harassment and inappropriate behaviour by a series of past and present female employees at Fox News. One of them, ex-anchor Gretchen Carlson, is suing him. Mr Ailes has denied the allegations.