The current issue of the Annual corresponds with the scholarly activities of the National Research University "Higher School of Economics." Ten of the fourteen papers have been written by the members of the research group at the Centre for Asian and African studies (http: //spb.hse.ru/caas/) and lecturers of the Department of Asian and African studies, St.Petersburg campus, HSE (http: //spb.hse.ru/daas/) in collaboration with the School of Asian studies, Moscow campus, HSE (http: //oriental.hse.ru/en/). Most papers were developed as part of the project titled "Minority vs Majority in the historical and cultural continuum of Asia and Africa." Along with academ-ics from Moscow and St. Petersburg, contributions to the Annual have been made by scholars from a number of research centres on Asian and African studies throughout Russia. Of special interest is the Russia and the East section that features an article by Oleg Ozerov, Ambassador of the Russian Federation to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Its topic is the tragic fate of the outstanding Russian diplomat Karim Hakimov and his work in the Arabian Peninsula in the 1920s-1930