brent: this is dw news live from berlin. tonight, she is no longer president of brazil -- doma recep has been removed from office. senators voted to strip her of all duties and privileges following an impeachment trial. lawmakers say it she illegally manipulated the budget when she ran for reelection in 2014. is this the end of the political crisis or just the next chapter? also this hour, we can do this

-- those words were the german chancellor's rally call to confront an unprecedented refugee crisis. one year later, we ask didn't chancellor make history by making a big mistake? i'm brent goff. good to have you with us. a political earthquake in brazil that most protected would come. senators in the country have voted to remove the president from office. they voted 61-20 in favor of sacking dilma rousseff who has been suspended since may. they found she had illegally manipulated government budgets during her 2014 reelection campaign. rousseff denounced the charges, saying the impeachmeme trial amounted to a coup.

the vice president has been sworn in to serve out the rest of the term. i'm joined now by the brazilian author regarded around the world as one of brazil's most insightful voices. good to have you with us on the show tonight. how did you feel when you saw what happened today in the senate chambers when the results were announced? guest: it is a bitter disappointment to everyone in my generation. we waited so long for democracy to come back in 1985 and we fought hard for that. i think most of us expected we would live out the rest of our lives in a real democracy and i'm not sure we can say brazil is a real democracy anymore. brent: a lot of people have said that what we are seeing here is the end of leftist rule in brazil. is leftist rule for you the same

thing as democracy in brazil? guest: absolutely not. the government we have had these past 12 or 13 years has not in leftist by any stretch of the imagination. really the kind of social democracy we have had in brazil with the pt governments have been similar to what a center-right government would do in europe. i don't think that pt is very much to the left, not as leftist as the opposition would like to make out. brent: what is going to happen now -- are you expecting any majojor changes? guest: sure. we know what is going to happen because he's been in power three-month and he's really turned the clock back five or 10 years. social programs have been cut, educational programs have been

cut, refugee programs are being cut. brent: haven't those been the same complaints from people about dilma rousseff? they said the economy doesn't work anymore, there's high unemployment -- is there money for social programs? guest: there is money and social programs have b been successful. one of them took 30 million people out o of poverty and th's been a hugely successful program. the u.n. recognizes it is one of the most important social programs and the last decades. thatat is what is being targeted now. it's not about the economy, it is about moving back to the 1960's and seeing things like racial equality, affirmative action, education, social and cultural programs, all of these things are being targeted and surgically removed as if they were a growth that is malignant

in society. brent: rousseff said she is the victim of a coup and that the right-wing politicians orchestrated a coup d'etat by getting rid of a democratically elected president. that's incredibly strong statement. guest: people keep arguing about what coup d'etat means. i'm not interested in what term we're going to use. what we see happening here is using the flimsiest pretext possible, they have removed an elected leader from government. brent: she is accused of fudging the books a little bit -- guest: nobody knows. he have to have a degree in accounting to understand the accusations. it's almost as if they are executing somebody or a traffic violation. brent: that's a good analogy.

what about the senators who convicted her today? a vast number of those senators have either been convicted or are facing criminal investigations. even ahead of the supreme court is someone facing investigations. is it possible for brazilians to trust anyone in the political establishment at this point? guest: there are some good politicians in brazil on both sides, but unfortunately, most people in congress and the judiciary are not trustworthy, not reliable. we have a well-known, notable congressman who has a red notice from interpol. he cannot leave brazil because he would be extradited for money laundering. we have a senator who voted today to impeach dilma rousseff with a helicopter with 450 kilos of cocaine. these are serious crimes and dilma rousseff has in impeach

for supposedly, possibly, arguably fudging the books, as you say and has been accused by people who are money launderers, drug traffickers, there's even a murder accusation against one congressman. brent: the list is horrible. you said in an interview here in berlin that you liked berlin because everything works here for top and people say what they mean. you say in brazil people don't usually say what they are thinking. does that explain or help us understand why a president who was elected twice can be hated and impeached and removed from office? guest: maybe. that's a huge psychological drama to talk about in less than a minute. i think there's a culture in brazil, especially among politicians of lying bare face of lee. dilma rousseff has done a lot of stupid things.

i don't think she has lied, not blatantly. everyone is accusing her -- these are people we cannot trust. brent: thank you very much. we appreciate it. but take a look now at how the social media world has been reacting to dilma rousseff's removal from office. one writer has tweeted that she is going to be rumored as the one, deserving impeachment or not, had the courage to leave out the front door. a lawyer in alabama is skeptical, he says dilma rousseff's removal should be acknowledged as a right wing coup and not an attempt to root out corruption. lady danger is concerned about the future -- everyone in brazil is celebrating impeachment day. while i hated her, i'm worried about what that means for democracy.

it is exactly one year since germany posture and slur, angela merkel, told her country "we can do this." those famous words came after the country declared would open its borders to asylum-seekers. chancellor merkel: i say quite simply, germany is a strong country. we have managed so much already, we can do this. we can do this.. and if there are hurdles in our way, we must overcome them and the government will do everything to achieve just that. brent: that was the german chancellor there, speaking. our political correspondent is here at the big table with me. good to have you back here. was the german chancellor telling the truth? has germany been able to do that? guest: in some aspect, i would

say germany is succeeding. for example, in registering the refugees that came in 2015, that took a few months. we managed to register them all. i think something else where germany might be succeeding is in the debate around the country's first-ever integration bill which we covered here a few months ago. that spells out what benefits a refugee will have and what he or she will have to do if he wants to stay. those are areas where germany has been making progress. there are also serious problems and i think germany's biggest failure has in not being able to convince others that this is a european challenge and not a german problem as others see it. brent: the chancellor hasn't

been able to convince eastern european countries in particular . she has not been able to convince the german voter, either. guest: that's correct. her approval ratings are around 37%. they have not been linear. it's more of a topsy-turvy curve. there are many people who are skeptical about angela merkel's leadership and even more are skeptical about her capacity to solve this refugee problem and that's a particularly big problem because there are a series of regional elections coming up. one coming up on sunday. in the next year, federal elections. and she has not decided whether she will stand for reelection but i am sure she's considering all these numbers of whether voters are thinking positively of her government. brent: a lot of people have said

in the last year, nonstop, that this is the one issue that could spell the end for angela merkel. people are still saying that and she is still the chancellor. guest: a few months and years ago, we were talking about the teflon chancellor. i don't think there is a teflon chancellor any longer. the fact she has been taking so long, she has not said whether she will end up for reelection, doesn't mean she is doubting that and doesn't know what she's going to do. brent: thank you very much. in a surprise move, u.s. presidential candidate, donald trump, has arrived in mexico. he will be meeting the president there, the leader of a nation he has called a source of rapists and criminals. we are going to go now to live pictures of that meeting. news of the meeting has sparked widespread outrage in mexico where trump is widely reviled.

use either the president of mexico speaking right now. trump has pledged to build a wall between the u.s. and mexico and says he will deport millions of people living in the u.s. illegally. many of them are mexican nationals. trump will later deliver a major speech on immigration in the u.s. state of arizona. arizona, by the way, does border mexico. and there you see those live pictures again, donald trump meeting with the leader of mexico. we want to talk more about this. i'm joined by our correspondent in washington. good afternoon. trump has labeled many mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. we are quoting him here -- mexico's leader has compared him to hitler'. are the two sides ignoring all

of that static during this visit? reporter: we will be watching that press conference which has only been getting started, to see what kind of mood music there is between the men. the existence of the press conference itself is a surprise. there was originally just talk of the two men issuing a statement. maybe that's a sign they are determined to put on a reasonably harmonious appearance because a press conference with two men standing there using words like rapist and hitler's against each other would be a diplomatic novelty. but with donald trump, you never know. he likes to be bold and unpredictable, so we will be seeing what comes out of that in the minutes ahead. brent: we are running out of time but we are going to get back to you if anything happens in that meeting. i think we can say an unexpected meeting between the leader of mexico and the republican presidential candidate, donald trump.

we're going to take a short rake. when we come back, kristof will be here with his business. we are back in about 60 seconds. >> the dw w media center - -- st live, find it again, here more of it. discover it. video and audio, podcasts and language courses in the dwdw mea center at media center. dw.com. >> did you know it costs $.50

defeat one hungry child for one full day? >> $.50 0 can feed one child today. > incredible. >> with the share the meal app, you can share your meal with children in need with just $.50 and a tap on your smartphone. together, we can end global hunger. please download the app. brent: you are with dw news live in berlin. our top story this hour -- violence has broken out in africa following a closely followed election there. the president was declalared the winner but his opponents are disputing the results. supporters of the opposition candidate have reportedly set fire to the countries are part -- countries parliament building. the election commission ruled

mongo secured a narrow win but challenger is disputing the results and is declaring himself the winner. he was running for reelection after succeeding his father in the presidency in 2009. sarah is with the electoral mission in the capital from where she joins us on the phone. good evening. violent clashes, including an attack on parliament have then reported since the result was announced. what are you hearing? guest: we are hearing reports of the parliament being set on fire and there are reports that the only daily newspaper, which is considered a pro-government paper has been set on fire and we are hearing about incidents of violence other parts of the country.

brent: the election observer mission said it lacked transparency. was it a free and fair election? guest: we gave our preliminary conclusion on monday. we had concerns about various aspects of the prospect -- of the process, including a lack of transparency. one of the things that has sparked the clash is we observe the voting procedures, even the door proroblems with p polling statioions opening late, it was considered to be quite transparent. the candidate representative has the right to take the protocol from the station.

we used different levels of access at the various levels, first at the department level and then at the provincial level. there are nine provinces and one of the things that sparked a controversy tonight was one of the nine provinces has shown a result of 99.93 t turnout, which 95 percent had gone to bongo. that''s one of the areas they ae strongly contesting. brent: to be clear, there are places where votes are being counted and tallied where you do not have access. for some type of manipulation to take place? guest: we had access at certain levels, but not every place. at the national level, we've been calling for the commission to publish the results polling

station by polling station so everyone can see if the polling station in that particular area made it out to the different consolidation levels, right to the national level with the same result. it is a recommendation that we have made. brent: we appreciate you taking the time to talk with us tonight. thank you very much. time now to talk business. you are going to tell us why short plane flight has made history. christoph: passengers cheered when the plane touched down and it was a historic arrival in havana today because for the first time in half a century, a regular commercial flight from the united states has landed in cuba. it's another o-matic milestone in the thawing relations --

another diplomatic milestone in the thawing relations between the countries and is expected to give cuba's tourist businesses a big boost. reporter: the jets blue flight landed on the pages of history. it's the first flight from the mainland to the commonest country in over five decades and is the first of 300 planned weekly flights between u.s. cities and cuban airports. the start of services to cuba marks a milestone in you -- in u.s.-cuba relations. jetblue highlighted how the world has changed since then and the aviation industry. >> we are delighted to be making history. we are a young airline. the last time there were scheduled flights to cuba, if you wanted to buy a ticket, you had to go to a ticket office. pan am, braniff, not around anymore. where did these airlines go? and you would fly to cuba on a

propeller plane. it just shows how in 55 years things have changed. reporter: but some things have remained the same. while the countries have been rebuilding diplomatic ties, the trade embargo has not been lifted and americans cannot officially visit cuba as tourists. exceptions are made for education and cultural travel. christoph: for some more inside, let's bring in our financial correspondent in new york. as this in cuba are hoping for more customers. what about companies in the u.s.? what do they expect? guest: if you think about cuba, is caribbean and there is tourism, you have a couple of big hotel changee and -- hotel chains and the airlines are hoping to get extra business. u.s. authorities gave permission to aid u.s. airlines to fly to

havana, but a lot of companies are trying to get there and not just american companies but european companies and i guess is this will be limited to a certain degree, but nobody wants to miss out on that additional business. christoph: let's take a quick look at the financial markets -- the dow finished with light losses today. what was on investors minds? guest: not much happened in august, even if you are at almost record levels. that's probably going to change the dynamics on wall street because there's a labor day meeting and the travel season comes to an end. the kids have to go back to school and can't expect a more active environment. now we get the next leg job

report and in three weeks, the next meeting of the federal reserve. historically, september is the weakest month of the year for wall street. so i would expect more action than we have seen in the past couple of weeks. christoph: our markets man in new york, thank you. shares of apple posted slight gains on wednesday. apparently the 13 billion euros in back taxes the european commission wants from apple has not scared off investors. the eu hit apple with its largest ever tax penalty, claiming it turned ireland's low corporate tax rate in two the tax rate and the european commission did not appeal the decision. reporter: this is apple's small european headquarters which rings and ilion's of profits for the tech giant.

for ireland, it's not worth risking the ire of a company that has created thousands of jobs here. the country is free to decide its own tax laws, but the competition watchdog says dublin has made special rules to benefit apple. >> we protect the treaty and the treaty gives the right for any member states have their own legislation. i think it's only fair competition is not just some companies pay their taxes but all companies pay their taxes. reporter: but the european commission decision has been controversial. authorities are contesting the claims that apple is getting special treatment, accusing eu officials of overstepping their power in their investigation of u.s. companies. >> our concern is that it's

using a state aid eerie to make tax law. it's doing it in a way that is retrtroactive andnd overridides nationonal tax l law authority n our view. we think it undermines the environment for international business because it creates uncertainty that will not be good for the european economy. reporter: but eu competition officials are sticking to their guns, confident an appeal will be upheld, saying it's a matter for the ball. not even apple can be left to its own devices. brent: thank you very much. after a short break, i will be back to take you through the day. but first, we're going to share some pictures from the under 12 football world challenge in tokyo where, as the game ended, the barcelona youth team started celebrating their victory until they saw the reaction of their

beaten japanese opponents. see you soon.

>> hello there, it is 9:00 p.m. here in the french cap toll. you are watching live from prison "france 24." i am catherine clifford, and these are your headlines. she says she is the victim after coup and will be back. latest reaction from dilma rousseff after she was removed from office in a senate impeachment vote this wednesday. the new brazilial president due to be sworn in within a couple of minutes time. a surprise and speedy visit to the country he once branded the home of rapists and criminals, donald trump is in mexico at the invitation of the mexican president just hours before