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"Responsibility to Protect" (R2P), a widely acknowledged but inconsistently observed principle of international relations, obliges individual state actors to shield their populations from mass violence -- and requires the international community to assist such states in the fulfillment of that duty.

Does R2P apply to the crisis in Syria? If so, how and to what practical effect? What other responsibilities and options might the United States and its allies have with respect to Syria's civilian population? And, more broadly, what are the near- and long-term prospects for a secure, stable, secular, and democratic post-Assad regime in Damascus?

A panel of distinguished experts discussed these and related questions in light of current, still unfolding events.