A vessel carrying at least 700 migrants has been intercepted off the eastern coast of Libya.

It was one of the largest interceptions in recent months of migrants seeking to reach Europe through the war-torn North African country.

The coast guard said the boat was stopped on Friday off the Mediterranean town of Moura, 90 kilometres (56 miles) west of the eastern city of Benghazi.

It said in a statement that the migrants hail from different nations and that those who illegally entered Libya would be handed over to their home countries.

The statement did not provide further details.

The coast guard posted images on Facebook showing a large, overcrowded vessel with most of those on board appearing to be young people.

It was one of the largest interceptions in recent months of migrants sailing to Europe.

In August last year, Italian military vessels aided a boat crammed with 539 migrants off the southern island of Lampedusa. The boat was launched from Libyan shores.

Libya has in recent years emerged as the dominant transit point for migrants seeking a better quality of life in Europe. The oil-rich country plunged into chaos following a Nato-backed uprising that toppled and killed longtime autocrat Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.

Human traffickers in recent years have benefited from the chaos in Libya, smuggling in migrants across the country’s lengthy borders with six nations.

The migrants are then packed into ill-equipped rubber boats and other vessels and set off on risky sea voyages. Officials did not say what kind of vessel was found over the weekend.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has reported 1,522 dead or missing migrants in the Mediterranean this year.

Overall, the IOM says 24,871 migrants have died or gone missing in the Mediterranean since 2014, with the real number believed to be even higher given the number of shipwrecks that are not reported.

On Saturday Lebanon’s navy and UN peacekeepers rescued more than 200 migrants from a boat sinking in the Mediterranean Sea hours after it left northern Lebanon’s coast. Two migrants were killed in the incident.

An army statement said the vessel was carrying people “who were trying to illegally leave Lebanon’s territorial waters”.

It said three Lebanese navy boats and one from the UN peacekeeping force in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, recused 232 migrants.

Reports from the northern city of Tripoli said Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinian men, women and children were on the boat that left northern Lebanon after midnight on Friday. Residents of Tripoli who are in contact with survivors said the dead were a Syrian woman and a Syrian child.

UNIFIL said in a statement that the Maritime Task Force is assisting the Lebanese navy in search and rescue operations in the sea between Beirut and Tripoli “where a boat in distress with a large number of people on board was found. Our Indonesian and Greek ships are on the scene.”

“We will continue to provide assistance,” UNIFIL said.

Lebanese security forces have been working to prevent migrants from heading to Europe at a time when the small nation is in the grips of the worst economic and financial crisis in its modern history.

A crowded boat capsized on September 21 off the coast of Tartus, Syria, just over a day after departing Lebanon. At least 94 people were killed, among them at least 24 children. Twenty people survived and some remain missing.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees says risky sea migration attempts from Lebanon over the past year have surged by 73%.