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Celtris III was the uninhabited Class M third planet in the Celtris system, Sector 864, Alpha Quadrant.

The lynar, a type of Celtran bat, was indigenous to this planet.

History

In the 24th century, this planet was in Cardassian space. It was near the Federation-Cardassian border.

In 2367, Starfleet Intelligence learned about an installation buried beneath the planet's surface. The information gathered about this installation was used later for the planning of a special operations mission led by Captain Jean-Luc Picard in 2369.

In that year, Starfleet Intelligence began monitoring bursts of theta-band subspace emissions from this installation on Celtris III, which typically indicated a metagenic device in operation. Since such devices were illegal, this led Starfleet to believe that the Cardassians might have been operating a secret research lab in this facility. However, Picard's team discovered that the signal had been faked and that they had walked into a trap. It was a ruse by the Cardassians to lure the captain, who was an expert in theta emissions, to the planet. The Cardassians assumed that the USS Enterprise-D, Picard's ship, would be the command ship of Sector 21527 and he would know the defenses of the Minos Korva system. During the team's escape from the planet, Picard was taken into custody and was later interrogated by Gul Madred.

During his negotiations with Captain Edward Jellico, Gul Lemec, using the elements of Picard's confession, alleged that the Federation had launched an unprovoked attack. In the allegation, Lemec said that Picard and his teammates, Dr. Beverly Crusher, and Worf, had assaulted an outpost on this planet, resulting in the deaths of 55 men, women, and children. They were holding Picard as evidence of this assault. The allegation was later dropped, and Picard was returned to the Federation. (TNG: "Chain Of Command, Part I", "Chain Of Command, Part II")

This planet's quadrant of origin was inferred based on the position of the Cardassian Union in the star chart appearing in the Star Trek: Picard episode "Maps and Legends".
"SELL-tris" was the pronunciation for this planet's name from the script pronunciation guide for "Chain of Command, Part II". [1]
The planet's classification came from the Star Trek Encyclopedia, 4th ed., vol. 1, p. 126.

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