Name: Cardassia Prime
Alignment: non-Federation, hostile
Home to: Cardassian race
Capital City: Cardassia City
Orbital star: Cardassia, Class K
Once a lush, verdant and arable planet, Cardassia suffered a natural catastrophe which devastated its surface and turned forests and hills into desert. The planet has little in the way of minerals and so a great famine descended, worsened by the military seizing power and ploughing all the planet’s finances into their war with the Federation. Cardassians are notoriously devious and mistrustful, and an air of paranoia cloaks everything they do. This can be seen (or could be, prior to the almost destruction of the planet and the elimination of its populace at the end of the Dominion War) in the huge viewscreens that frown down from many buildings, as the feared Obsidian Order makes no secret about its ubiquitous surveillance of its people. Orwellian is the word that springs to mind, and the people live in fear and dread of the knock on the door in the dead of night.
Despite the unremitting grey sameness of much of the architecture and the barren expanse that proliferates outside the walls of the cities, there is much beauty to be found on Cardassia, such as the Mekor Wilderness, where the rocks form into sublime shapes and there are subterranean caverns. The State Intelligence uses this area as a place to train its recruits, and maintains an institute there. Unwary travellers though may fall prey to the Honge, a huge flying pterodactyl-like creature, or even the Mekarian sawtooth, a carnivorous plant native to the region. There is also one rainforest remaining on the planet, and its location in Morfan Province makes it a popular destination for Cardassian holidaymakers.