PARIS (AFP) - An Al-Qaeda bomb intercepted in Britain last week part way between Yemen and the United States was disarmed just 17 minutes before it was programmed to detonate, French officials said Thursday. Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said that one of two parcel bombs found last Thursday at airports in Dubai and Britain was close to exploding, and officials in his office told AFP he was referring to the British package. There were parcel bombs from Yemen heading for the United States, and I can tell you, for example, that one of these parcels was disarmed 17 minutes before the planned explosion, Hortefeux told France 2 television. He made the remark during a more general discussion of the threat of militant attacks on France and was not pressed for more information. He did not say what was the source of his information about the imminent blast. The British interior ministry and Londons Metropolitan Police said they would not comment on operational matters. Packages addressed to synagogues in Chicago and holding the hard-to-detect explosive PETN hidden in ink toner cartridges were uncovered in Dubai and Britains East Midlands Airport last week, sparking a global security alert. Meanwhile, Greek police announced Thursday that a 14th parcel bomb had been intercepted and detonated after staff at the French embassy raised the alarm over a package delivered to them. The device was ostensibly sent from the Orthodox archbishopric of Athens, but explosives had been hidden inside a hollowed-out copy of a book, police said. In Paris, France confirmed its Athens embassy had received a parcel bomb. Greek police said the package had immediately aroused suspicions at the embassy, which sent it back to the delivery company in the southern Athens suburb of Kallithea. The explosives were hidden in a volume of the complete works of George Souris, a Greek satirical poet of the 19th century. The radical far-left Conspiracy of Fire Nuclei is thought to be behind the wave of parcel bombs that have been mailed to European leaders and institutions as well as foreign embassies in Athens. Only one has caused any injuries, to an employee of a courier company who was burned on the hand when a parcel addressed to the Mexican embassy ignited. Authorities bolstered security arrangements at Athens embassies in the wake of the attacks and halted all foreign mail and parcel deliveries for two days to enable a thorough re-examination of pending dispatches.