Obama offers comfort to 9/11 mourners

United States President Barack Obama spoke at the Pentagon this morning to those who lost loved ones on September 11, 2001, telling them no words would heal their pain, according to a report on www.cnn.com.



At the same time he called for a renewed resolve against the ones who attacked the country eight years ago.



Obama laid a wreath of white flowers at the Pentagon, where 184 people lost their lives when a hijacked jet smashed into the military icon outside the nation\'s capital.



\"No words can ease the ache of your hearts,\" Obama told a crowd of relatives and friends standing under umbrellas in a steady rain.



Earlier in the day, the president and first lady Michelle Obama held a moment of silence outside the White House to mark the eighth anniversary of the Al Qaeda attacks that killed 2,752 people.



There was silence at the site of the former World Trade Center at 8:46 a.m., the time the first plane struck the North Tower, followed by another at 9:03 a.m. when a jet struck the South Tower.



Family members and friends of those killed read their names in solemn roll calls at each site as bells tolled.