Capital: Kinshasa

Currency: Congolese Franc

Language: French (official)

The approximately 70 million inhabitants can be divided into more than 200 ethnic groups. There is a great diversity of languages, the lingua franca is French. About half of the inhabitants profess the Catholic Church, while the other half are divided among Kimbanguists, other Christian churches, traditional religions and Islam.

Despite its wealth of raw materials, the state is now one of the poorest countries in the world, due to decades of exploitation, corruption, years of war and constant population growth. The Democratic Republic of Congo ranked second to last in the United Nations Human Development Index in 2013.