Green Day album tops UK chart

Singer Billy Joe Armstrong has attacked President Bush

US punk-pop band Green Day's latest CD has topped the UK album chart, selling 1.45m copies worldwide in its first week of release.

The group's ninth album American Idiot knocked Embrace's Out Of Nothing from the UK top spot, chart officials said.

It is also number one in Australia and Japan, and is set to top the charts in the US and Canada, Warner Music said.

Warners said the album had sold 200,000 copies in the UK - and was poised to breach the 2m sales mark worldwide.

"This record is going to sell two or three times what their last couple of albums sold," said John Reid, Warner Music International's executive vice-president of marketing.

He said the success was partly down to the strength of the group's hit single - the album's title track - which takes a swipe at US President George W Bush.

The song contains the lyrics: "Don't want to be an American Idiot/Don't want a nation under the new mania/Can you hear the sound of hysteria?"

Singer Billie Joe Armstrong has reportedly referred to Mr Bush in an interview as "one of the worst presidents the United States has ever had".

The album - the band's first since 2000 - has also reached the top 10 in Ireland and Italy on the back of largely positive reviews from critics.