BEIJING -- China is continuing to bring back home its nationals evacuated from war-torn Libya.

All Chinese in Libya who wanted to return to China and whose whereabouts were known by the Chinese Foreign Ministry, have been evacuated to third countries, and most have been further flown back to China.

A total of 35,860 Chinese citizens have been evacuated from Libya, and 20,745 are already back in China as of 23:10 Wednesday Beijing time (1510 GMT), the ministry said.

It was the largest and the most complicated overseas evacuation ever conducted by the Chinese government since 1949.

Early Saturday, China's western-route evacuation in Libya ended as the last group of Chinese evacuees boarded a China-bound chartered plane on Tunisia's Djerba island.

The Boeing B-777, operated by China Southern Airlines and carrying 344 employees of the Beijing Construction Engineering Group (BCEG), took off from the island at 1:10 a.m. local time (0010 GMT).

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Zhuo Ruisheng, counselor of the Chinese embassy in Tunisia and chief of the western-route evacuation mission, said as many as 10,675 Chinese nationals have been evacuated to Tunisia from western Libya since February 23.

A total of 10,158 Chinese evacuees who had entered Tunisia by land at the Ras El Jedir border crossing have flown back to China or are on their way home aboard 34 flights. Meanwhile, another 517 evacuees have returned home through other channels.

Zhuo described the western-route evacuation as a great success. He said the effort was a huge and complex mission due to limited time and the large number of evacuees.

Also early Saturday, the last batch of 274 Chinese nationals evacuated from Libya to Greece's Crete Island boarded a China-bound chartered plane.

The Air China plane took off at 0:08 a.m. local time (2208 GMT Friday).

So far, all 13,186 Chinese evacuated from Libya to Crete have been flown back home.

Starting on February 23, the Chinese embassy in Greece chartered three Greek superliners, which shuttled between Libya's ports and Crete five times to evacuate Chinese nationals and over 1,100 foreigners.

Meanwhile, the Chinese government arranged 40 chartered flights to bring its nationals back home from Crete.

The Chinese embassy rented 20 hotels with altogether some 10,000 beds and 55 buses to accommodate the Chinese evacuees on the island.

Greek authorities made it easier for the Chinese evacuees to pass through customs, and local citizens showed their great hospitality.

On Friday, four Il-76 transport aircraft from China's air force landed in Beijing, bringing back 287 evacuees from Libya.

The first aircraft, with 80 people on board, arrived at the Beijing Nanyuan Airport in the city's south at 8:35 a.m. local time (0035 GMT), after a 12-hour flight from Khartoum, capital of Sudan.

The fourth aircraft arrived in Beijing two hours later.

From February 28 to March 2, the four aircraft have evacuated a total of 1,655 Chinese out of Libya to Sudan.

Also on Friday, Luo Yuan, a major general and also a researcher with the People's Liberation Army Academy of Military Science, told Xinhua the Chinese military is likely to participate in more evacuations of overseas Chinese if necessary.

"If there's an emergency and there are a huge number of overseas Chinese needing to be evacuated, then it's quite necessary for the army to step in and help the government get them out," Luo said.

The Chinese military dispatched a warship and four military aircraft this week to help the Chinese government bring Chinese back home from Libya.