Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre has asked the Financial Times to correct its report that Vladimir Putin spoke at length about medieval Slavic history during a phone call with Støre and Finnish President Alexander Stubb.

"We asked the Financial Times to correct this because it is not true. And they will, because we were involved in the conversation," Støre told the Norwegian daily VG.

VG reported that the Financial Times would make no changes after Støre asked it to correct the report.

The FT reported on October 28, citing people familiar with the conversation, that Putin spent most of his October 27 call with Støre and Finnish President Alexander Stubb discussing the history of the Slavs in the Middle Ages and what the Kremlin calls the “root causes” of the war. The report said a ceasefire was raised only briefly. The call had been scheduled for under 30 minutes and lasted about 90, according to the report. One source said the leaders chose not to interrupt because they wanted to gauge how serious Putin was about talking to Europe.

Putin asked to set out his view of the situation and went through events in Europe from 2014 to the present, and speaking time was shared roughly evenly, Støre told the broadcaster TV 2.

"We had an hour and a half. There were interpreters, so some time goes to interpretation," he said.

The dispute feeds into the argument over whether Europe should open its own line to the Kremlin. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen criticised the call as uncoordinated with allies, amid a Europe already divided over Putin contacts. Støre’s account presents the call as a working exchange as the US prepares to resume three-way talks with Russia and Ukraine in Abu Dhabi.

Stubb called the conversation "frank and substantive" in the Finnish presidency's statement. The Kremlin's readout said Putin had set out the "root causes" of the conflict and blamed the "confrontational" policy of EU and Nato countries for prolonging the fighting.

Journalist Leonid Ragozin questioned the FT's sourcing on X.

"Claims by FT sources about Putin spending most of the call with Støre/Stubb ranting about medieval Slavic history don't quite square with either Kremlin's or Norwegian/Finnish readouts," he wrote, adding that the claims "reinforce a repetitive psy-ops narrative", which made him wonder about the sources.

Putin has a record of long historical digressions. He opened his February 2024 interview with US talk-show host Tucker Carlson with a half-hour account of Russian history, and reportedly returned to the theme at his August 2025 summit with Donald Trump in Alaska.

"There was an agreement that if the leaders wanted to call Putin, he would always pick up the phone," presidential aide Yuri Ushakov told Zvezda TV, adding that the next round of trilateral talks with the US and Ukraine would take place after November 4.