When the perpetrators of the December 2 shooting that killed 14 people in San Bernardino, California, were found to be American Muslim couple Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, Donald Trump jumped into action, immediately using the incident to ratchet up campaign rhetoric. He called for a "total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the US until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on."

The streets near Saint-Denis-Universit station were eerily deserted; the bus stop stood empty, even taxis were hard to find. The scene bore little resemblance to the area's usual hustle and bustle.

It was a Friday night and the Bataclan concert hall was crowded with more than 1,000 fans gathered to watch the Californian band Eagles of Death Metal last weekend. Loud rock music reverberated in the popular venue. Julien Pearce, a journalist from Europe 1 Radio, was inside the concert hall when the shooting began an hour after the band started playing.

The visit last week of Denmark's Queen Margarethe II and her husband Prince Henrik to Indonesia is one indication of improving relations between the two countries. Beyond the usual protocols were serious meetings and discussions between Indonesian government and private sector representatives with a Danish delegation 62 business people, the first of such in the 65 years of relations between the two countries.