Ministry of Defence

Drummer Lee Rigby was identified Thursday as the soldier killed in London in a suspected terror attack on Wednesday.

The British soldier brutally killed in London in a suspected terror attack was a drummer in a military band who had served in Afghanistan, officials said on Thursday.

Lee Rigby, 25, known as “Riggers” to his friends, was killed in broad daylight on Wednesday as he walked in Woolwich, South London, near an army barracks.

In a statement, the U.K. Ministry of Defence said Rigby, who served with the 2nd Battalion The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, was “a loving father” to his two-year-old son Jack.

“An extremely popular and witty soldier, Drummer Rigby was a larger than life personality within the Corps of Drums and was well known, liked and respected across the Second Fusiliers,” the statement said.

“He will be sorely missed by all who knew him. The Regiment’s thoughts and prayers are with his family during this extremely difficult time,” it added. “Once a Fusilier, always a Fusilier.”

The statement said Rigby was born in Manchester, England and had joined the army in 2006.

It said he had been deployed on operation in Helmand province, Afghanistan, in April 2009, “where he served as a member of the Fire Support Group in Patrol Base Woqab.”

Rigby had previously helped guard the U.K.’s royal palaces. “He was an integral member of the Corps of Drums throughout the Battalion’s time on public duties, the highlight of which was being a part of the Household Division’s Beating the Retreat - a real honour for a line infantry Corps of Drums,” the statement said.

He had also served with his unit in Cyprus and Germany. In 2011, Rigby began a recruiting post in London and assisted with duties at the Tower of London.

The commanding officer of the Second Fusiliers, Lieutenant Colonel Jim Taylor, said Rigby was “a dedicated and professional soldier.”

“Larger than life, he was at the heart of our Corps of Drums. An experienced and talented side drummer and machine gunner, he was a true warrior and served with distinction in Afghanistan, Germany and Cyprus,” he said.

His platoon commander from 2010 to 2011, Captain Alan Williamson said “Riggers” was a “cheeky and humorous man, always there with a joke to brighten the mood.”

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• PhotoBlog: Britons react with horror and anger to London attack
• 'Leave our lands': Man knifed to death in suspected London terror attack

Roger Vikstr / EPA

People gather at a protest against police violence and vandalism in Husby, northern Stockholm, Sweden, on May 22.

STOCKHOLM -- Hundreds of youths have torched cars and attacked police in four nights of riots in immigrant suburbs of Sweden's capital, shocking a country that dodged the worst of the financial crisis but failed to solve youth unemployment and resentment among asylum seekers.

Violence spread from the north to the south of the city on Wednesday as groups of youths pushed through Stockholm's suburbs casting stones, breaking windows and setting cars alight. Police in the southern Swedish city of Malmo said two cars had been set ablaze.

Local media said a police station office was set on fire in the southern suburb of Rågsved, where several people were also detained. No one was hurt and the fire was quickly put out.

The attackers have awaited nightfall before setting out, defying a call for calm from the country's prime minister and damaging stores, schools, a police station and an arts and crafts center in the four days of violence.

"I think there is a feeling that we need to be in more places tonight," said Towe Hagg, spokeswoman for Stockholm police. One police officer was injured in the latest attacks and five people were arrested for attempted arson.

Selcuk Ceken, who works at a local youth activity center in Hagsatra, said between 40 and 50 youths threw stones at police and smashed windows, then ran off in different directions. He noted the people were in their 20s and seemed well organized.

"It's difficult to say why they're doing this," he said. "Maybe it's anger at the law and order forces, maybe it's anger at their own personal situation, such as unemployment or having nowhere to live."

The riots appear to have been sparked by the police killing of a 69-year-old man wielding a machete in the suburb of Husby this month, which prompted accusations of police brutality. The riots then spread from Husby to other poor Stockholm suburbs.

"We see a society that is becoming increasingly divided and where the gaps, both socially and economically, are becoming larger," said Rami Al-khamisi, co-founder of Megafonen, a group that works for social change in the suburbs.

"And the people out here are being hit the hardest ... We have institutional racism."

The riots were less severe than those of the past two summers in Britain and France but provided a reminder that even in places less ravaged by the financial crisis than Greece or Spain, state belt-tightening is toughest on the poor, especially immigrants.

"The reason is very simple. Unemployment, the housing situation, disrespect from police," said Rouzbeh Djalaie, editor of the local Norra Sidan newspaper, which covers Husby. "It just takes something to start a riot, and that was the shooting."

Djalaie said youths were often stopped by police in the streets for unnecessary identity checks. During the riots, he said some police called local youths "apes."

The television pictures of blazing cars come as a jolt to a country proud of its reputation for social justice as well as its hospitality toward refugees from war and repression.

"I understand why many people who live in these suburbs and in Husby are worried, upset, angry and concerned," said Justice Minister Beatrice Ask. "Social exclusion is a very serious cause of many problems, we understand that."

After decades of practicing the "Swedish model" of generous welfare benefits, Stockholm has been reducing the role of the state since the 1990s, spurring the fastest growth in inequality of any advanced OECD economy.

While average living standards are still among the highest in Europe, successive governments have failed to substantially reduce long-term youth unemployment and poverty, which have affected immigrant communities worst.

Some 15 percent of the population are foreign-born, and unemployment among these stands at 16 percent, compared with 6 percent for native Swedes, according to OECD data.

Youth unemployment in Husby, at 6 percent, is twice the overall average across the capital.

Related:

Sweden stunned by third night of rioting

Issouf Sanogo / AFP - Getty Images, file

Suicide bombers on Thursday attacked France-owned nuclear giant Areva's uranium mine in Arlit, Niger, seen here on September 26, 2010.

NIAMEY, Niger - Suicide bombers struck a mine run by French nuclear group Areva and a military barracks in Niger on Thursday, killing and wounding several people in separate attacks that underline the widening threat posed by Islamist militants across West Africa.

Military sources said several soldiers were killed in a gun battle with Islamists following a car bomb attack at the barracks in Agadez, the largest town in northern Niger.

Areva said at least 13 members of staff were wounded in another bomb attack at about the same time at the Somair uranium mine it operates in the town of Arlit, in Niger's desert north.

A spokesman for the Niger government, Morou Amadou, said the attacks were by Islamist militants, probably from al Qaeda's north Africa wing, al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) or its spin-off West African group The Movement for Unity and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO), which seized control of neighboring north Mali last year before being ousted by a French-led offensive launched in January.

"These are terrorists who have carried out the suicide attacks in Agadez and Arlit," he said. "The terrorists - I don't know for sure whether it was AQIM or MUJAO - infiltrated these towns and security forces have been deployed and are scouring the area."

The suicide attacks were the first in Niger since the offensive in northern Mali drove Islamist groups there into the vast, empty desert and across borders into neighboring Sahel states.

The Niger army has deployed as part of a West African force in Mali. Islamist suicide bombers have carried out a spate of attacks there in recent months, including one on a Niger army barracks earlier this month.

Military sources in Agadez said a suicide bomber drove a truck through the barrier of the town's military base before dawn on Thursday and detonated his explosives when soldiers opened fire.

"The suicide bomber was not alone: There were other terrorists who followed in cars and there were clashes," said one of the military sources, who said there were several dead on both sides. "The situation is now under control."

A Western diplomat, who asked not to be identified, said at least 10 people had been killed in the attack.

Areva said in a statement issued in Paris that at least 13 members of staff were wounded in the attack on its Somair mine.

The company said security at the site was being handled by the Niger military, though French sources had recently said Paris planned to send special forces to the area for extra protection.

"The group condemns this odious attack against its staff," Areva said. "We express our solidarity with the government and the people of Niger in this common trial."

Niger's armed forces have taken part in recent weeks in a joint operation against Boko Haram Islamists in the Nigerian town of Baga on the shore of Lake Chad, in which dozens of people were reported killed.

Nigeria, to the south, again asked its neighbor for military aid this week, after President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in three northern states and launched an offensive against Boko Haram insurgents.

Nigeria worries that the four-year-old insurgency based in its remote northeast is being fed from abroad, through Niger, Chad and Cameroon. 

Related:

• Why France is taking on Mali extremists
• After Algerian incident, West Africa fears Mali spillover
• Al Qaeda-linked militants planned attack on US Embassy in Egypt

This story was originally published on Thu May 23, 2013 7:17 AM EDT

Chip Somodevilla / Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images file

Attorney General Eric Holder testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee on March 6.

The Obama administration publicly acknowledged for the first time Wednesday that U.S. drone strikes have killed four American citizens since 2009, including the previously undisclosed death of a North Carolina resident who left the United States for Pakistan and was later indicted on federal terrorism charges.

Attorney General Eric Holder, in a letter to congressional leaders and chairman of key congressional committees made public on the eve of what was billed as a major counterterrorism speech by President Barack Obama, also confirmed the deaths in drone attacks in Yemen of three other Americans that already had been widely reported: those of radical cleric Anwar Al-Awlaki , his teenage son, Abd al-Rahmn Anwar al-Awlaki; and Samir Khan, the American who ran al Qaeda’s web-based propaganda magazine Inspire.  Previously the Obama administration had only acknowledged the senior Awlaki’s killing and refused to publicly confirm or deny reports of the other deaths.

The letter also confirmed that U.S. drones had killed Jude Kenan Mohammed of Raleigh, N.C., more than a  year after a local news report quoted a friend as saying he had died in an attack in Pakistan in November 2011.

Holder said in the letter that the senior Awlaki was the only U.S. citizen targeted in a drone strike.

Anonymous / AP

Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born Yemeni cleric and recruiter for al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen, is shown in an October 2008 file photo.

He also provided new details about what the U.S. says were Awlaki's operational roles in terror plots, including his role in a 2010 attempt to bomb cargo planes by putting bombs in printer cartridges.

It also included an explicit explanation of the U.S. policy for targeted killings of Americans, much of which was included in a “white paper” obtained by NBC News in February.

Mohammed’s death appears to have been news to the FBI, which as of Thursday still listed him on its “most wanted” list, saying, “On July 22, 2009, a federal grand jury in North Carolina indicted Jude Kenan Mohammad for conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and conspiracy to murder, kidnap, maim, and injure persons in a foreign country. Mohammad is at large … (and) is believed to be in Pakistan.”

A law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity told NBC News: “We don’t know when he was killed. That fact was classified.”

FBI spokeswoman Shelley Lynch said in an email: "Jude Kenan Mohammed remained wanted until there was official confirmation of death.  Until now, the matter was classified and it is now appropriate for the wanted poster to be removed from our website." 

Obama is expected to discuss the drone program Thursday in a speech at the National Defense University in Washington, D.C.

Release of Holder’s letter came as classified documents obtained by NBC News raised new questions about the CIA-run drone program and whether it is consistent with public comments by Obama and other administration officials describing  the strikes as “very precise” and targeted at specific al Qaeda operatives and their associates. In fact, the documents show, the agency has frequently attacked low-level militants and foreign fighters in Pakistan whose names and nationalities were not known, as well as militant groups not directly connected to al Qaeda.

The documents, similar to those recently reported by McClatchy Newspapers, offer a window into the secretive drone program and how its actual operations sometimes differ from the public accounts provided by the administration.

They appear to officially confirm that the agency has engaged in “signature strikes” – a much discussed and controversial practice that has never been publicly acknowledged -- in which CIA drone operators target individuals based on the “signature characteristics” of suspects but whose actual identities are not clear.

They surface at a time that U.S officials appear to be scaling back the drone program – amid warnings from some  former military and intelligence officials that the attacks may be creating a backlash harmful to U.S. interests in the long run.

 When Obama was asked about the drone program last year during a Google News forum, he called it “a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists.” In an April 2012 speech, then White House counter-terrorism adviser and now CIA Director John Brennan said: “The United States Government conducts targeted strikes against specific al Qaeda terrorists,” while acknowledging that drone targets included “associated forces.”

But a CIA list of 53 drone strikes in the fall of 2010 indicates that fewer than half – 22 -- listed al Qaeda operatives as the targets. Other strikes were aimed at targets that included suspected members of the militant al-Haqqani network in Pakistan, which is believed to have harbored and worked with al Qaeda; members of the Pakistani Taliban, an Islamic fundamentalist military group that aims to overthrow the Pakistani government; and members of another Pakistani terrorist network identified as the “Commander Nazir Group.”  Fourteen of the strikes listed the targets only as “other militants.”

Agency lists for other periods show a higher proportion of strikes being specifically aimed at Al Qaeda operatives. For example, during a nine month period between January and September 2011, 28 out of 42 strikes listed al Qaeda members as targets.

But in other accounts of the strikes, agency officials refer to the targeting of individuals whose identifies do not appear to be known. One 2009 attack was described as being aimed at “military aged males”  at a site “associated with al Qaeda explosives training.” Another, in 2010, described the target as “four adult males conducting weapons training.”

The CIA and White House did not respond to requests for comment about the documents. But U.S. officials have vigorously defended the drone program and their public accounts of it, while saying they are limited in what they can say because of its classified nature and the potential impacts of full public disclosure in Pakistan. As for the use of signature strikes , they have argued that “when you have a bunch of guys building explosives, you don’t need to know who they are. They are an imminent threat.”

NBC News’ Pete Williams, Chuck Todd and Tom Curry contributed to this report.

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LONDON -- A man was killed by knife-wielding assailants on a London street Wednesday, and a bloodstained suspect at the scene holding a meat cleaver was captured on video telling passers-by: "We swear by the almighty Allah."

Eyewitnesses said the two attackers were later shot by officers, and described the victim as being chopped like a "piece of meat." Those two men were taken to a hospital where they were later arrested.

Local lawmaker Nick Raynsford said the dead man was a British soldier serving at a nearby barracks, but the Ministry of Defence could not immediately confirm this.

The man holding the cleaver was videotaped by a bystander saying: "By Allah we swear by the almighty Allah and we will never stop fighting you until you leave us alone."

In the video, obtained exclusively by NBC's UK news partner, ITV News, the man also said: "Leave our lands and we can all live in peace, that's all I have to say."

Prime Minister David Cameron, on a trip to Paris which he cut short to return to London and chair an emergency national security meeting, said: "It is the most appalling crime. Tonight our thoughts should be with the victim and their families and friends.

"People across Britain, people in every community, I believe, will utterly condemn this attack. We have had these sorts of attacks before in our country and we never buckle in the face of them.

"In a free country, the best way to defeat terrorism is to live your life, to show that terrorists can never win."

The two suspects were being treated at separate London hospitals, police said.

A senior British security source said it appeared to be an "ideologically motivated" killing. "From the look of it, it is indeed a low-tech terror attack," the source said.

"I am afraid it is overwhelmingly likely now to be a terrorist attack, the kind the city has seen before," London mayor Boris Johnson said in televised remarks.

The Muslim Council of Great Britain condemned the killing, which it said "will no doubt heighten tensions on the streets of the United Kingdom."

"This is a truly barbaric act that has no basis in Islam and we condemn this unreservedly," it said. "Our thoughts are with the victim and his family."

A witness identified as James told local radio station LBC that he saw two suspects attack the young victim with knives, including a meat cleaver.

"They were hacking at this poor guy, literally," he told the station. "They were hacking at him, chopping him, cutting him."

Multiple witnesses said the victim was wearing a T-shirt bearing the logo of the veterans charity Help for Heroes.

The attack took place less than a mile from a military barracks, in Woolwich, southeast London.

Britain’s Home Secretary Theresa May told ITV News she had been briefed by the Director General of the Security Service MI5 on what she called a "sickening and barbaric" attack.

One eyewitness posted on Twitter that he had seen the victim "with his head chopped off" but this was not confirmed by any police or government officials.

Local resident Graham Wilders told the BBC he saw a man pulling out a handgun. He said: 

“As I drove around the corner I see the car on the pavement. I thought there’s been an accident … there was two people leaning over and I thought they were trying to resuscitate him, there was a bloke against the wall.

“Next minute ... another bloke has come along and told me they were actually stabbing him, apparently they actually run the car into him and knocked him down before they done anything.

“And then next minute there was a bloke come along in a silver little car and he got out and he shouted out to everyone ‘someone phone the police.’ So we phone the police. So next minute what happened he actually pulled a handgun out.”

“Next minute I see the silver car shoot off.”

Metropolitan Police Commander Simon Letchford told reporters there were "a number of weapons" used in the attack, including a firearm. 

The attack happened at 2:20 p.m. local time (9:20 a.m. ET), he said. The attackers pounced on the victim in broad daylight.

After making his statement in the video (seen below), the man with the bloody knives walked back to the scene and spoke to the other suspect casually. 

Meanwhile, the New York Police Department on Wednesday said it had increased coverage of the British consulate, military recruiting stations and other locations as a result of the British attack. But department spokesman Paul Browne said those moves were not made based on information those facilities had been targeted, but rather in an abundance of caution.

NBC News' Richard Esposito contributed to this report

This story was originally published on Wed May 22, 2013 5:49 PM EDT

Fabrizio Giovannozzi / AP, file

The Duomo in Florence is the fifth largest in Europe.

ROME, Italy - An American tourist underwent emergency surgery after being stabbed in the Italian city of Florence on Tuesday, a hospital doctor and media reports said.

The 68-year-old was in front of the city’s famed Duomo cathedral listening to a street musician with his wife when someone tried to mug him and he resisted, according to a report by Italian news agency, ANSA.

The report said he suffered knife wounds to a kidney and a lung.

Armando Sarti, head of the emergency care department at the Santa Maria Nuova Hospital, said by phone on Wednesday that the man was recovering after an operation.

“The patient underwent surgery overnight and his condition has now improved and ... seems to be stable, although it is too early to release him from intensive care,” he said.

A hospital spokesman said the man's kidney was removed during surgery.

Local media reports in Florence said a 37-year-old Italian man from Bari was arrested shortly after the mugging and remained in custody, although this could not immediately be confirmed with police.

• More NBC News coverage of Italy

Abedin Taherkenareh / EPA

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (L) and presidential candidate Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei (R) flash the victory sign as Mashaie registers his candidacy at the Interior Ministry during the registration for Iran's upcoming presidential election on 14 June, in Tehran, Iran, on May 11.

DUBAI -- Iranian authorities have barred two potentially powerful and disruptive candidates from running in next month's presidential election, ensuring a contest largely among hardliners loyal to the clerical supreme leader.

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a veteran companion of the Islamic Republic's founder, a former president and thought potentially sympathetic to reform, was denied a place on the ballot by the Guardian Council of clerics and jurists, state media said Tuesday.

Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, a close aide to outgoing president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was also barred. His hardline followers have jockeyed with those of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Ahmadinejad, who cannot run for a third consecutive term himself, said on Wednesday he would challenge the ban on Mashaie, calling him a "righteous person and beneficial for the country," according to the ISNA news agency.

"In my opinion there will be no problem with the Leader and I will take up this issue until the last moment with him," Ahmadinejad said. "I am hopeful the problem will be solved."

Supreme leader's website via EPA

A handout picture made available by Iranian Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's official website shows Ayatollah Khamenei delivering his Persian New Year message to the nation in Tehran, Iran, 20 March 2013.

Mashaie was quoted by Fars news agency as saying he considered his disqualification "unjust and I will pursue a resolution to it via the supreme leader."

His campaign office issued a statement calling for restraint by his followers.

"We ask all grassroots and spontaneous staff and supporters of Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie to stay calm and organize their activities so that they do not provide the means for malice by enemies of the Islamic Revolution," it said.

But Eshaq Jahangiri, head of Rafsanjani's campaign, was quoted by INSA on Wednesday as saying the veteran politician would not object to the Guardian Council's decision.

"Mr. Hashemi Rafsanjani and his campaign as a whole entered the field on the basis of following the rule of law and morals, and will continue in this way as well," Jahangiri said.

Two of Rafsanjani's children have recently been imprisoned.

Most of the remaining eight men on the ballot for the first round on June 14 are seen as loyalists to Khamenei, who seems determined to avoid a repeat of the popular unrest that followed Ahmadinejad's re-election in 2009.

The election comes at a time when Iran is engaged in bitter economic, diplomatic and military confrontations with the West, Israel and its Arab neighbors.

There is no clear frontrunner in a field that now includes Saeed Jalili, the chief negotiator for Iran's controversial nuclear program, Ali Akbar Velayati, Khamenei's foreign policy adviser, and Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf, the mayor of Tehran.

With economic hardships increasing as a result of Western sanctions over the nuclear dispute, some Iranians have favored a change of tack and there is still substantial public support for reformist leaders who disputed their electoral defeat four years ago and are now under house arrest.

Khamenei could over-rule the Guardian Council and reinstate candidates but analysts said the moves at this stage, especially against Rafsanjani, appeared designed to nip protest in the bud.

Slideshow: Everyday life in Iran

At schools, in shops, and on the streets of big cities and small towns, daily life plays out in Iran.

Launch slideshow

Four years ago, Ahmadinejad was declared outright winner in the first round against three other candidates including the reformist Mirhossein Mousavi, sparking weeks of protests. Mousavi and another leader of the liberal "Green Movement," Mehdi Karoubi, have been under house arrest for over two years.

The other five approved candidates on the Interior Ministry list for this year’s election were: Mohsen Rezaie, a former head of the Revolutionary Guards; Gholam Ali Haddad-Adel, another close aide to Khamenei; Hassan Rohani, a former nuclear negotiator close to Rafsanjani; Mohammad Gharazi, a former telecommunications minister; and Mohammad Reza Aref, the only clear reformist left on the list.

"All of the approved candidates are either loyal to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei or are mostly irrelevant," said Alireza Nader, an analyst at RAND Corporation. "Khamenei may still overturn the decision, but Rafsanjani's disqualification shows that Khamenei is determined to wield all power. This appears to be a presidential selection rather than an election."

Related:

• Iran election primer: After Ahmadinejad, who will lead?
• Analysis: Iran's Ahmadinejad will fight 'like Scarface' for his political future
• Who's who in Iran's presidential race

Tiziana Fabi / AFP - Getty Images, file

Costa Concordia captain Francesco Schettino leaves after a session of the trial in the Costa Concordia cruise ship disaster on April 15, 2013 in Grosseto.

ROME -- He was judged guilty by public opinion after his cruise ship, the Costa Concordia, capsized off the tiny Italian island of Giglio last year, killing 32 people and leaving thousands traumatized. Now Captain Francesco Schettino will face justice in a court of law.

A judge in Grosseto, a town in Tuscany, announced Wednesday that there was enough evidence to try Schettino for manslaughter, causing a shipwreck and abandoning ship while 4,200 passengers and crew were still aboard. Schettino denies the charges.

The Costa Concordia ran aground in January 2012 as it passed very close to the island's shore. It was one of the most high-profile shipwrecks since the sinking of the Titanic in 1912.

Slideshow: Luxury cruise ship runs aground

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The Costa Concordia, carrying more than 4,200 passengers, ran aground Jan. 13 off the coast of Italy killing 32 people - including two Americans.

Launch slideshow

Schettino will be the only defendant in the trial, which will begin on July 9 in Grosseto. Five other defendants have sought plea bargains in separate cases.

Schettino's defense team tried to convince Judge Paolo Molino to drop the charge of abandonment of ship, one of the worst and most embarrassing offenses for a captain. But Molino ruled there was enough evidence to suggest the captain left the cruise liner voluntarily hours before the last passenger was rescued, rather than falling off the ship accidentally as he initially claimed.

"I can only tell you that anyone who has been in a position of authority would feel very, very depressed, exactly as he feels," said Francesco Pepe, Schettino's lawyer. 

He could face up to 20 years in prison if convicted, according to his lawyer.

Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Related:

Full coverage of the Costa Concordia disaster on NBCNews.com

Slideshow: The artist strikes a nerve

Sharron Lovell / Polaris

Ai Weiwei, whose sculpture representing the mythical figures of the Chinese zodiac will be unveiled Monday in New York, has been detained by Chinese authorities and accused of serious crimes. Click to see photos of some of his most influential works.

Launch slideshow

BEIJING – China’s Ai Weiwei on Wednesday released a profanity-laced heavy-metal single based on the 81 days the firebrand artist and activist spent in detention.

Written and sung by Ai with music by prominent Chinese rocker Zuoxiao Zuzhou, “Dumbass” is “is a wall-to-wall simulation of the prison cell that Weiwei was detained in,” a spokeswoman for Ai said.

Lyrics in the song, translated into English, include "**** forgiveness, tolerance be damned, to hell with manners, the low-life’s invincible," and "The field is full of ****ers, dumbasses are everywhere."

A video to accompany the song is available to watch on YouTube [note: profanity in Chinese].

Ai’s detention and the hefty $2.4 million tax bill later levied against him led to protests around the world, as well as an upsurge of support in China for the award-winning artist, who was placed under house arrest following his release.

Ai said that recreating his cell and the traumatic experience of being imprisoned – which Ai claims included 24-hour supervision by two military police sergeants, even as he slept and used the bathroom – was a cathartic experience.   

The Chinese government has never confirmed the details of Ai’s detention.

The track, the first single off his new album “The Divine Comedy,” was described in a press release from his studio as “Ai Weiwei’s reflection on the struggle of protecting human rights and the freedom of expression in China.”

The Divine Comedy is expected to be released fully in June on Ai’s website and on iTunes.

Ai’s spokeswoman said that the artist was working on a second album that will shift away from the heavy-metal and towards a more romantic tone.

Related:

• Dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei goes 'Gangnam Style'

• Chinese artist Ai Weiwei warned not to attend his own court case

• Ai Weiwei turns camera on himself, citing 'global' problem

Jonathan Nackstrand / AFP - Getty Images

Firemen extinguish a burning car in Kista, Stockholm after riots on Tuesday night.

STOCKHOLM - Hundreds of youths set fire to cars and attacked police and rescue services in suburbs of Stockholm Tuesday night in Sweden's worst disorder in years.

A police station in the Jakobsberg area in the northwest of the city was attacked, two schools were damaged and an arts and crafts center was set ablaze, despite a call for calm from Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt.

It was the third night of unrest, mainly in suburbs where many immigrants live.

The riots, in one of Europe's richest capitals, have shocked a country that prides itself on a reputation for social justice, and fuelled a debate about how Sweden is coping with both youth unemployment and an influx of immigrants.

"We've had around 30 cars set on fire last night, fires that we connect to youth gangs and criminals," Kjell Lindgren, spokesman for Stockholm police, said on Wednesday.

He said eight people had been arrested on Tuesday night, but there were no reports of injuries.

The riots appear to have been sparked by the police killing of a 69-year-old man wielding a machete in the suburb of Husby this month, which prompted accusations of police brutality.

"Everyone must pitch in to restore calm - parents, adults," Reinfeldt told reporters on Tuesday.

After decades of practicing the "Swedish model" of generous welfare benefits, Sweden has been reducing the role of the state since the 1990s, spurring the fastest growth in inequality of any advanced OECD economy.

While average living standards are still among the highest in Europe, governments have failed to substantially reduce long-term youth unemployment and poverty, which have affected immigrant communities worst.

The left-leaning tabloid Aftonbladet said the riots represented a "gigantic failure" of government policies, which had underpinned the rise of ghettos in the suburbs.

"We have failed to give many of the people in the suburbs a hope for the future," Anna-Margrethe Livh of the opposition Left Party wrote in the daily Svenska Dagbladet.

An anti-immigrant party, the Sweden Democrats, has risen to third in polls ahead of a general election due next year, reflecting unease about immigrants among many voters.

Some 15 percent of the population is foreign-born, the highest proportion in the Nordic region. Unemployment among those born outside Sweden stands at 16 percent, compared with 6 percent for native Swedes, according to OECD data.

Among 44 industrialized countries, Sweden ranked fourth in the absolute number of asylum seekers, and second relative to its population, according to U.N. figures. 

Kim Kwang Hyon / AP

Choe Ryong Hae, center, and other North Korean delegates pose before leaving Pyongyang airport for China on Wednesday.

North Korea says that a "special envoy" for leader Kim Jong Un has left for China.

The North's official Korean Central News Agency said in a short dispatch Wednesday that the envoy was Choe Ryong Hae.

There were no other details. Choe is the North Korea military's top political officer tasked with supervising the 1.2-million-strong force.

China is North Korea's only major political and economic benefactor. Beijing has faced pressure from Washington to use its influence to push Pyongyang to abandon its nuclear ambitions.

Kim Jong Un hasn't visited Beijing since he took power after his father Kim Jong Il died in December 2011.

Choe was one of a handful of new vice marshals North Korea announced last year.

The Associated Press