Libya's neighbours Algeria and Tunisia on Saturday readied themselves for a new tide of refugees while France sent a warship to repatriate Egyptian refugees fleeing the unrest.

In Algeria authorities said they were strengthening their reception capacity for refugees from Libya with a new facility at Ifri, about 2,000 kilometres (1,200 miles) southeast of Algiers.

It will have 10 tents each capable of sleeping 16 people and will reinforce the small campsites already in existence at the border posts of Tinalkoum, Tarat and Debdeb.

These have had 400 tents added and been assigned eight civil defence doctors, according to the organisation's director Mustapha Lahbiri, quoted by the Algerian APS news agency.

On the other side of the country Tunisia was waiting for a new influx of thousands of refugees, after only 3,000 arrived on Friday, according to the regional Tunisian Red Crescent organiser.

"We are expecting that the normal flow of around 10,000 new arrivals a day will resume," Monji Slim said.

"The refugees are waiting on the Libyan side in nearby towns, they know that the border is jammed, they are waiting for evacuations to proceed to cross," he said, adding that "most Egyptians have been evacuated."

At midday on Saturday groups of dozens of refugees — Bangladeshis, Somalis, Ghanaians and Vietnamese — were crossing the border on foot.

The French helicopter carrier Mistral left the southern port of Toulon Saturday bound for southern Tunisia from where it will help evacuate Egyptian refugees from Libya.

Accompanied by a frigate it is due to repatriate at least 900 Egyptians from the Tunisian port of Sarzis. The ship is due to arrive Monday and reach the Egyptian port of Alexandria after three days at sea.

earlier related report

Beijing says all Chinese evacuated from Libya
Beijing (AFP) March 5, 2011 –

China said Saturday it had completed the evacuation of all its nationals from strife-torn Libya following the largest such overseas operation ever undertaken by Beijing.

Two charter flights Saturday had taken 778 people from the north African country, where an uprising against the regime of Moamer Kadhafi is raging, a statement from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

"The government's working group on Libya has successfully completed the evacuation of Chinese citizens from Libya," the statement on the ministry website's said.

Beijing will continue to send military and charter planes to repatriate Chinese from other countries in the region, the ministry said, adding it hoped to have them all home within a few days.

On Wednesday, Vice Foreign Minister Song Tao said almost 36,000 Chinese had been evacuated from Libya and nearly 21,000 had already returned to China.

China had 847,000 workers scattered around the world at the end of 2010 — 69,000 more than in 2009 — with about 30 percent employed in the construction industry, according to official figures.

Most of the Chinese nationals in Libya were working in the railways, oil and telecom sectors, according to state media.

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