A Chinese navy frigate has already reached mission waters off Libya on Tuesday to offer support and protection for ships evacuating Chinese nationals.

The frigate, Xuzhou, met with a Greek merchant vessel chartered by the Chinese government carrying evacuees, and started its escort mission.

The frigate was previously on an escort mission in the Aden Gulf, where shipping is vulnerable to attacks from pirates.

According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, China has altogether pulled out about 32,000 nationals from Libya as of 2 p.m. Tuesday.

Among the evacuees, 9,000 were back in China, roughly 21,000 were in a third country, while 2,100 were on their way to a third country.