Read the entire article: not a single confirmed fact related to the meetings, everything is proposed by sources. And that embassy had plenty of photographers and journalists around it, yet there isn't a single photo of Paul Manafort at the embassy. You'd think they could run with one of the many photos that would have been taken and offered to them for money.

Is the "misunderstanding" here that The Guardian or other UK papers can print claims from "sources" without verifying a single piece of materially important information?

You seem to be here to defend The Guardian in this long thread about what a great paper it is, but your defense is to make a comparison to The Sun and target it at people who are pointing out that The Guardian has printed obvious lies (actual "fake news") in meddling with US politics. That's a really interesting way to defend them. One would think such defense in a thread like this might be inspired by their honesty and integrity as a news organization, but it's actually that it's okay to lie by claiming sources said something because The Sun did it.

Well, they did have "sources say" in the title not the small print. There's some speculation here that "someone planted this story as a means to discredit the journalists" https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/11/28/paul-mana...

But that's the point. The guardian is only reporting what sources say, and they're clear about that.

You're holding the guardian to higher standards than any other UK print media.

A credible newspaper should do some fact checking before printing what 'sources say', otherwise its just PR for whatever wants to get this published.

Person A: The Guardian is great. Their "quality is consistently high."

Person B: The Guardian tells lies about relatively important stories like Assange and Manafort meeting.

Person C (you): Actually, all UK print media lies!

Is this a fair characterization of what just happened?

No.

The Guardian has not lied. The Guardian has accurately reported what sources said. This is what all UK print media does. Guardian is somewhat better than some other UK print media because they'll (as they did here) include the words "sources say" in the headline or sub head, or they'll include quote marks in the headline.

Okay, this seems like a bad faith argument to me. You must be aware that print media in the UK, including The Guardian, also publish stories that are backed by real evidence (e.g. photos, videos, people openly stating, "I personally did/said that", etc.) rather than mysterious, unnamed sources.

Plus, it looks disingenuous to pretend that The Guardian didn't willfully choose to print this story instead of any of the many many stories about Barack Obama being a "secret Muslim" or even "gay" according to some source.

You can further clarify why you think The Guardian is actually good if you want, but if it involves, "Everyone else publishes stories from sources," I'm done taking it seriously.

They straight-up fabricated this story and have yet to retract. This wasn't an editorial either this was supposed to be 'real' news.