It will probably come as no surprise that the Cayman Islands connection in all this is that the alleged crooks all set up bogus companies and accounts - you guessed it - here to hide their ill-gotten gains.

Now, while we profess to be serious about the country's 'know your client' policy and while we have been commended by the International Monetary Fund, (IMF) and other international regulators for cleaning up our act, it appears that the Cayman Islands is still attracting questionable money.

However, even more damaging than the fact that some dubious money transfers are still slipping through, what is no doubt a much-improved net, this country has not, it seems, been able to shake off the legacy of The Firm - the movie, filmed here, which alleged that we only deal with ill-gotten sums of money.

No matter how much the offshore sector here has reportedly cleaned up its act, the image of the Cayman Islands overseas is still as a haven for money laundering or a place to hide ill-gotten gains.

Those war racketeers did not choose London, Paris, New York, Tokyo, Frankfurt, or even Zurich to open the accounts for their war-profit, they chose here.

Not randomly either, but because that is how the rest of the world views this country.

Like it or not, that is the situation and each day on these pages, this publication shows Cayman what the rest of the world is saying about the country with our special daily feature - Cayman Islands in the Foreign Press.

And almost without fail on most days at least one story will refer to some financial misdemeanour with a Cayman connection, however tenuous.

Blamed as Cayman Net News may be for running these stories, our role as publishers of a newspaper is to inform our readers and as we have noted on previous occasions, we don't make these stories, we simply report them.

The issue here is our national image, and that lies in the hands of numerous agencies from the Cayman Islands Monetary Authority, (CIMA) and the Bankers Association to Government Information Services, (GIS) and the Cayman Islands Investment Bureau. Even the Department of Tourism should have a role in changing the stereotypical image that this country has overseas.

Cayman's image abroad appears to be no different today than it was when John Grisham first wrote his infamous novel in 1991.

Somehow the agencies entrusted with building Cayman's reputation need to collaborate and make a concerted effort to infiltrate the international media with positive images in particular about the offshore sector.

The success of our captives or hedge fund industries remains a closely guarded secret in the financial world. How much we have improved in terms of knowing for the most part who is doing business here is something that the agencies need to let everyone know.

Shaking off The Firm image was never going to be easy, not least because the novel was a runaway bestseller, followed by an even more successful blockbuster movie.

The book was published fifteen years ago and times have changed, but unless those agencies here responsible for Cayman's image abroad start being considerably more proactive, it will be more than another fifteen years before the international perception of this country is changed.

Without a serious commitment to telling the world what really goes on here, the war-profiteers and any other shady financial dealers will still be mistaken that this country is the first choice for their dirty money.

There is no doubt that we have become and intend to remain a clean jurisdiction in which to do business.

The question is however when it comes to financial transactions, how clean do we want those who would invest here to think we are?

That is the question deserving of answers we must be prepared to provide if anyone does ask.