The debate on reforming the citizenship law and the plans of the red-green (i.e. SPD-Green) government coalition to introduce dual citizenship roused conservatives but also mobilized right-wing extremists. Extreme right-wing groups demonstrated against the reform in numerous towns and cities. Taken in February 1999, this photograph shows about 800 supporters of the extreme right-wing National Democratic Party of Germany [Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands or NPD] on the cathedral square [Domplatz] in Magdeburg. The demonstrators had gathered behind police cordons to protest the federal government’s plans to introduce dual citizenship. Local police and the Federal Border Guard [Bundesgrenzschutz] had erected the cordons to prevent clashes between right-wing extremists and the approximately 1,000 leftist counter-demonstrators who also turned out that day.