Russian Telegraph Agency ROSTA

the central information organ of the Soviet government from September 1918 to July 1925. It was formed by a decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK), merging the Press Bureau of VTsIK with the Petrograd Telegraph Agency. At a ROSTA congress in 1919, it was announced that the agency would take on the function of carrying the party line in the press. During the Civil War, ROSTA participated in the work of VTsIK propaganda trains and published instruction leaflets to help local press organs, wall newspapers, posters, and weeklies. In November 1920, ROSTA became part of the Central Political Education Committee of the People’s Commissariat of Education of the RSFSR.

In September 1922 a decree of VTsIK and the Council of People’s Commissars established a central information organ—the Russian Telegraph Agency of the VTsIK—which was given control of all Soviet information agencies, a number of bureaus of the People’s Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, and the Commercial Telegraph Agency. By this time, ROSTA had representatives in the republic and provincial capitals, as well as in the important industrial and district centers. Divisions of ROSTA existed in the Ukraine, Transcaucasia, and Turkestan.

After the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union (TASS) was formed on July 10, 1925, ROSTA became the agency for the RSFSR. In March 1935, ROSTA was dissolved as the agency of the RSFSR, and its functions were taken over by TASS.