The number of Congolese people in Britain is a major part of the story of modern asylum movements into western Europe.
There was no official count of DR Congo-born people before 2001, and since then increases in people seeking refuge and removals of failed asylum seekers mean that the Census figure should be treated with caution.
At the Census there were fewer than 9,000 DR Congo-born people in Britain. Eight out of 10 of them were living in London boroughs.
Beyond the capital, the predominant reason for clusters of DR Congo-born people would be asylum dispersals to cities outside the South East.