Top police officials have met to discuss the repercussions of a Catalan spying scandal that could involve politicians, judges, prosecutors, businessmen and women and well known celebrities. The case is being regarded as an anti-nationalistic conspiracy to undermine the sovereignty drive in Catalonia.

 The scandal broke last week when a former policeman who worked for the private investigation company, Metodo 3, handed Barcelona police copies of recordings of a conversation between the leader of the Catalan Popular Party, Alicia Sanchez-Camacho, and Maria Victoria Alvarez, the former lover of Jordi Pujol Ferrusola, whose father is Jordi Pujol, in July 2010.

 Hidden microphones captured a conversation in which Alvarez told the PP leader how she witnessed Pujol Ferrusola laundering money on behalf of his family.

Now a Barcelona court has accepted a lawsuit filed by Sanchez-Camacho, against Metodo 3,asking that the detective agancy hand over its client list and an injunction to prevent the broadcasting of the taped conversation.

 The Catalan PP believes the Catalan Socialists may have ordered the spying, in which a bug was apparently hidden in a vase of flowers on the table.