So far, foreign reporters in Pyongyang see sights, but not main show

Workers chat during a government organised visit for foreign reporters to the Pyongyang 326 Electric Cable Factory in Pyongyang, North Korea May 6, 2016. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

PYONGYANG (Reuters) - On the first day of North Korea's biggest political gathering in 36 years on Friday, the closest visiting foreign journalists got to the action was across the street, hundreds of metres from the hall where the Seventh Workers' Party Congress was taking place.

Inside the venue, an imposing stone hall the size of two soccer pitches, North Korea's 33-year-old leader Kim Jong Un was presumed to be kicking off an event where he is expected to outline his "Byongjin" policy of simultaneous pursuit of nuclear weapons and economic growth.