ASGARD HIGH COUNCIL
The Asgard High Council was the main governing body of the Asgard race. The Council chamber seated seven representatives, and members of the High Council had included Thor, Penegal, and Freyr, who had acted as the Council leader. As the deciding body for key issues affecting planets under Asgard protection, the High Council had designated worlds such as Cimmeria and K'tau as safe for developing sentient species, had sent representatives such as Thor to negotiate membership under the Protected Planets Treaty, and had approved the trade or sharing of technology including hyperdrive and weapons systems for the Prometheus. Through the Hall of Wisdom on K'tau, O'Neill had communicated with the Asgard High Council via live holographic images, however O'Neill's requests for Asgard assistance to save K'tau and to prevent an asteroid's collision with Earth would have nullified the Protected Planets Treaty, and those requests were denied by the Council. The Asgard considered Earth to be a valuable ally, and when Kinsey was poised to take command of the SGC, Thor declared the High Council's preference that the SGC remain under the control of the Air Force.
The Council had determined strategies and resources to be used in battling the Replicators, and they had devised the plan to relocate the Asgard population to Orilla in order to trap the Replicators in a time dilation bubble on the original homeworld of Hala. However, the Asgard faced extinction when the physiological degeneration of the cloned race left each of them with a rapidly progressing disease. It was the decision of the High Council that the race would be extinguished before the degeneration had gone too far, and although not all on the High Council agreed that Earth was sufficiently advanced, many considered the humans of Earth to be the Fifth Race in whom the hope for preserving the future lay. The Asgard installed all of their knowledge and most current technology aboard the Odyssey, which would become their final legacy, and as Ori warships appeared above Orilla, the Asgard High Council made the decision to end their civilization. Orilla was destroyed in a massive explosion, and the Asgard race was gone.
Cross Reference: Asgard, Freyr, Hall of Wisdom, Holographic Projection, Orilla, Penegal, Protected Planets Treaty, Thor