Libyan authorities have issued permission for Russian planes to land in Tripoli to evacuate Russian nationals from the turbulent North African state, Russia's ambassador to Libya Vladimir Chamov said.

Yury Brazhnikov, who heads the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry's department for international activities, said the Libyan civil aviation service is to give "an authorization number for the planes to land in Tripoli."

"This will allow Eurocontrol [European air traffic watchdog] to give permission for the entire en-route flight to Libya," Brazhnikov said.

Russian Emergency Situations Minister Sergei Shoigu said the Russian planes were expected to take off at around 2 p.m. Moscow time (11:00 GMT).

Russia is sending four airplanes to evacuate a total of 563 Russian nationals from Libya. Most of them are employees of the Russian Railways monopoly and the Gazprom energy giant or families of Russian diplomats.

Moscow is also expected to evacuate another 700 Turkish and Serbian nationals who are working for Russian Railways in Libya, the ministry said.

Most Russians in Libya are located in Ras Lanuf and Surt, in the north of the country.

The Russian Emergency Situations said earlier it was considering evacuating people on a ferry to Turkey.

Egypt's MENA news agency reported on Tuesday that Libya has also allowed two Egyptian military transport planes to land in Tripoli to evacuate Egyptian citizens.

Egyptian authorities earlier announced they were sending two ferries to bring their nationals home from Benghazi in eastern Libya, where the local airport's runway has been destroyed.

The Egyptian Foreign Ministry said at least two its nationals have been shot dead in the protests.