Turkey objects in part to Obama's Armenia speech

SOFIA, April 25 (Reuters) - Turkey's president on Saturday said he disagreed with parts of U.S. President Barack Obama's statement on the mass killings of Armenians in 1915, adding hundreds of thousands of Turks and Muslims also died.

Obama avoided using the word genocide on Friday when describing the killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915, and welcomed efforts by Turkey and Armenia to normalise relations.

Turkey accepts that many Christian Armenians were killed by Ottoman Turks but denies that up to 1.5 million died and that it amounts to genocide.

In Turkey's first official reaction to the statement, President Abdullah Gul said: "There are points on which I disagree. Hundreds of thousands of Turks and Muslims also died in 1915. Everyone's pain must be shared," according to state-run news agency Anatolian.

As a presidential candidate Obama, who took office in January, described the killings of Armenians as genocide but he referred to them as "atrocities" on Friday.

Armenian American groups criticized Obama for not keeping a campaign pledge to stick to the genocide characterisation. (Writing by Alexandra Hudson; Editing by Jon Boyle)