Muslims around world decry Trump's proposal to keep them out

US presidential candidate Donald Trump has called for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States," immigrants and visitors alike, because of what he describes as hatred among "large segments of the Muslim population" toward Americans.

The agency is asking Muslims in other countries for their thoughts on his proposal: 

SOMCHAI JEWANGMA, an officer with Thailand's Sheikhul Islam Office:

"I don't think that can ever be done. The United States has economic ties with Islamic countries and there are millions of Muslim people in America. This is just a policy to please those who don't like Muslims and to gain more support.

"It's true that there are Muslim extremists, those who don't have good intentions for Islam. But there are 1.7 billion Muslim people in the world. If we were all bad, then the world would be uninhabitable."

Somchai also said entry rules already have become stricter: "When I applied for a US visa, I was inspected for months." 

AZRA KHAN, president of the Canberra Islamic Center in Australia, said Trump's proposal is the wrong way to address last week's attack in San Bernardino, California, in which a Muslim couple killed 14 people:

"Clearly Donald Trump is trying to inflame the situation. Clearly this tragedy is not about Muslims.

"He could better improve the situation if he were to say, 'Let the U.S. take guns more seriously and ban them.' That one simple solution would be much more suitable and make the streets of America far safer."