Armageddon Convention

The Armageddon Convention was a conference of the major galactic powers with the intention of outlawing some of the more devastating weapons they had developed. Organised by Irving Braxiatel, it was convened on the flying island of Laputa near Venice in 1609.

History

It took much painstaking negotiation for Braxiatel to get the major powers to agree to attend the Convention. One of the preconditions they insisted upon was that it be chaired by the Doctor, whose campaign to outlaw Miniscopes had won him respect across the galaxy.

However Braxiatel's agents accidentally brought the wrong man to Laputa and the Convention was actually mediated by the Human churchman Cardinal Bellarmine, who believed he was intervening in a war between angels and whose negotiating strategy was thus largely derived from the Biblical Book of Revelation.

The Convention was nearly destroyed by the Greld, who attempted to infiltrate a composite meta-cobalt bomb onto Laputa despite Braxiatel's defensive precautions. Fortunately the weapon never achieved critical mass, largely due to the involvement of the Doctor, who happened to be in the area anyway.

Braxiatel's own servitors, the Jamarians, proved unexpectedly ambitious, and attempted to loot the delegates' ships for knowledge of advanced technology they wished to use to carve out their own empire. Fortuitously they were destroyed when the meta-cobalt device eventually detonated.

The Convention eventually came to a successful conclusion, with Bellarmine returned to Venice with his memory erased, although Braxiatel decided to retire from politics. (MA: The Empire of Glass)

Notable non-participants

Inevitably, several of the galaxy's most warlike cultures refused even to attend the Convention. These included the Daleks and the Cybermen. (DW: Revenge of the Cybermen (novelisation)) Despite this, the Convention still apparently outlawed the use of Cyberbombs.(DW: Revenge of the Cybermen)

Why they bothered to do this when the sole manufacturer of the weapon was neither attending nor signing the Convention is a mystery, although perhaps the Convention banned that general type of bomb. Given the relatively early date of the Convention, possibly the Cybermen had not even yet developed this technology. Possibly, a species could get legally bound to an agreement even without their consent, if they refused to attend.