More than 1,000 foreign journalists worldwide have applied to cover the upcoming 18th CPC National Congress beginning on Thursday, a substantial increase over the previous Party congress five years ago.

As the twice-in-a-decade congress approaches, reporters are gathering in Beijing to cover the most important event of China's political calendar. The media center has received applications from over 1,000 foreign reporters, as well as around 400 reporters from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao.

"We welcome all foreign reporter applications, but due to space and resource restrictions we may need to further consider the number of press representatives allowed for each meeting," said a media center officer.

The focus of interest of foreign journalists covers a wide range of topics beyond China's leadership change, ranging from environmental protection to economic restructuring and from cultural reform to food safety.

Petri Saraste, senior Asia correspondent with Finnish broadcaster MTV3, is also planning to interview a CPC member from ethnic groups at the congress, to gain a fresh perspective into the country's development and the major challenges it faces.

Yu Weiwei, with the Beijing office of Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera, will be attending the meeting with another Italian reporter and she is particularly curious as to how the general public view the congress.

"The major issues I'll be focusing on are the leadership transition and amendments to the Party Constitution. I'm also interested to learn more about China's future reforms, including fighting corruption and the declaration of officials' assets," said Yu.

"I want to find out how the life of the Chinese public has changed overthe past five years. I have also been trying to contact some private entrepreneurs, who are also Party members, to share their thoughts about how they handle these two aspects of their lives," Yu told the Global Times Monday.

The Party congress has seen a substantial increase in foreign reporters since 2007, when 744 foreign journalists from more than 300 news agencies were present.

Another reporter with a European news magazine, who came to China in early September to cover anti-Japanese demonstrations, told the Global Times it will be his first time working on a Chinese Party event.

"I'm interested in how it's organized, how effective it is and how professional it will be in dealing with traditional media and social media alike. It also interests me whether the Party will succeed in translating this huge event into communications with young people and Web users, and how the public will respond."

"I was surprised to find the Japanese carmaker Toyota is sponsoring a website of the Party congress," he said, adding that he would also like to showcase the personality of China's new leaders.

A reporter with a foreign radio station, who requested anonymity, said he will be approaching the congress from both political and economic aspects.

"The rest of the world is interested in what's happening in China, and it'll be very interesting to see what the priorities will be for China in the upcoming five years, what's the plan to increase economic growth and stabilizing the economy," he said.

The media center for the congress began operation on November 1 to provide service to all reporters. On Thursday, the center also launched its official website (www.cpcnews.cn) to offer journalists and readers information about the congress' agenda, the latest news and announcements as well as background information on past CPC national congresses in both Chinese and English.

Xinhua contributed to this story