US MUST do more to protect its children: Obama

United States President Barack Obama has said America must do more to protect its children in the wake of Friday's shootings at a school in Newtown, Connecticut, BBC reported.

Speaking at an inter-faith vigil in Newtown, Obama said he would use the powers of his office to prevent a repeat of the tragedy, the report stated.

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He told residents that the nation shared their grief.

Twenty children and six women died in the assault on Sandy Hook school by a lone man who then took his own life.

The gunman has been identified by police as Adam Lanza, 20.

He shot dead his mother before driving to the school in her car.

Officials say he was armed with hundreds of rounds of ammunition, and used a semi-automatic rifle as his main weapon. He was also carrying two handguns, and a shotgun was recovered from a car, reports said.

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"I come to offer the love and prayers of a nation," Obama said, speaking after religious leaders and the state governor.

"You are not alone in your grief. All across this land of ours we have wept with you."

Obama repeated a call for action against gun crime, saying that in coming weeks he would use "whatever powers" his office held "in an effort aimed at preventing more tragedies like this", BBC said.

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"We can't tolerate this anymore," he said. "These tragedies must end and to end them we must change."

The complex causes of gun crime "can't be an excuse for inaction", he said, the BBC report stated.

Obama also met the shooting victims' families and emergency service workers.