Is Reverend Moon dealing with North Korea?

By Rory O'Connor

NEW YORK, April 15, 2005 -- What role is Reverend Sun Myung Moon - major media mogul and motivating force behind the Washington Times daily newspaper, the United Press International news service, and many other journalistic properties - playing in the ongoing nuclear negotiations between North Korea's leaders and the Bush Administration?

Although the evidence is circumstantial, it appears as if Moon - a self-styled "Messiah" who has called America "Satan's Harvest," and who has given speeches titled "The Last Days are Coming to America" - may also be functioning as a middleman between George W. Bush and Korean dictator and junior Axis of Evil member Kim Jong Il.

Moon's idiosyncratic politics and theology have long identified six countries - the United States, Russia, China, Japan, and North and South Korea - at the center of an anticipated apocalyptic confrontation, a final Armageddon-like battle, in which Moon and his Unification Church would play a key role.