Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre denied reports that Putin spent most of his time talking about the history of the Slavs during a telephone conversation with him and Finnish President Alexander Stubb.
The Financial Times (FT) reported the day before. According to the publicationʼs sources, during a 90-minute phone call on October 27, Putin spent most of the time telling Støre and Stubb about medieval history and did not discuss the prospect of an immediate ceasefire at all.
But in an interview with TV2, the Norwegian prime minister denied this.
“This is not true. We have asked the Financial Times to correct the article,” he said.
According to Støre, Putin asked to present his version of the current situation and in this context spoke about the events from 2014 to the present. He also noted that the parties spoke for approximately the same amount of time, and part of the conversation went into translation.
"The claim that he was giving some lecture on Slavic history is simply wrong," Støre said.
At the same time, the Financial Times refused to change the publication. In a comment to the Norwegian publication VG, a representative of the publication stated that the editorial board “remains true to its journalistic principles”.
- The conversation between the leaders of Norway and Finland and Putin took place on the eve of a new round of peace talks involving Ukraine, Russia and the United States, which is scheduled to take place next month.
- Before the call, Støre and Stubb consulted with Kyiv and were supposed to convey Ukraineʼs position to Putin ahead of the talks.
- This conversation between European leaders and the Russian dictator was the first since French President Emmanuel Macron called Putin last July.
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