Tongil Group Tongil Group Tongil Group is a South Korean business group (chaebol) associated with the Unification Church. (“Tongil” is Korean for “unification,” the name of the Unification Church in Korean is “Tongilgyo.”) It was founded in 1963 by Unification Church founder Sun Myung Moon (following the purchase of a surplus Japanese lathe in 1962) as a nonprofit organization which would provide revenue for the church. Its core focus was manufacturing but in the 1970s and 1980s it expanded by founding or acquiring businesses in pharmaceuticals, tourism, and publishing. In 1998 Tongil Group was about 35th in size among South Korean business
Unification Church of the United States success, the "Times" was well-read in conservative and anti-communist circles and was credited by President Ronald Reagan with helping to win the Cold War. In 1983 church members publicly protested against the Soviet Union over its shooting down of Korean Airlines Flight 007. In 1984, church member Dan Fefferman founded the International Coalition for Religious Freedom in Virginia, which is active in protesting what it considers to be threats to religious freedom by governmental agencies. In 1986 conservative author William Rusher wrote: "The members the Reverend Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church, now almost universally referred to as 'Moonies,' constitute a