The collection of articles is based on the results of the round table held by the Center for International Security of the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) on March 11, 2015. It includes pieces by experts in Oriental studies and international relations from IMEMO, Institute of Oriental Studies, Institute for U.S. and Canada Studies of Russian Academy of Sciences, MGIMO University and the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Service, as well as scholars from Armenia and Kazakhstan, and representatives of Iraqi Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora in Moscow. Authors offered broad analysis of the situation in Kurdish enclaves in Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Iran and countries of Central Asia and South Caucasus. The general opinion of the round table participants was that in the conditions of a growing threat of a seizure of power by radical Islamists in a number of states of Middle East, the Kurd minority objectively can play an increasingly important role in stabilizing the military-political situation in each of countries of their compact settlements and in the whole region.