Tucker Carlson and Vladimir Putin were in the spotlight on Thursday night, as the divisive, Trump-supporting rightwing commentator interviewed the reclusive Russian autocrat, Ednews reports referring to The Guardian.

The two-hour interview, filmed in Moscow, was Putin’s first with a western media outlet since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Putin spent more than 30 minutes giving a history of Russia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine, in a monologue that took viewers from the ninth century rule of Oleg the Wise, to the struggles of the 1300s, through to a critique of Lenin’s foreign policy.

There were peace talks with Ukraine that were “almost finalized”, Putin said, but then Ukraine “threw away all these agreements and obeyed the instructions of western countries, European countries and the United States to fight Russia to the bitter end”.

But in the interview, Putin told Carlson that Russia and the US still speak “through various agencies” about ending the conflict.

Russia’s message to the US, Putin said, is: “If you really want to stop fighting, you need to stop supplying weapons. It will be over within a few weeks.”

Putin said the last time he spoke to Joe Biden was before Russia invaded Ukraine.