The United Nations refugee agency says Libyas coast guard has recovered some 100 bodies of Europe-bound migrants off its coast in 2018. A statement from UNHCR late Sunday also said that as of July 31, the Libyan coast guard had also intercepted or rescued 12,633 migrants near its shores, in the Mediterranean Sea. Libya has emerged as a major transit point to Europe for people fleeing poverty and civil war elsewhere in Africa. Human traffickers have exploited Libyas chaos following the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed longtime ruler Moammar Gadhafi. Libyan authorities have stepped up efforts to stem the flow of migrants, with assistance from European countries eager to slow the influx. European far-right-wing parties have also seized upon the issue of the migrant crisis to gain electoral support. Meanwhile, Spanish rescue services said on Sunday that almost 400 migrants were rescued in the Mediterranean this weekend as they attempted to make the crossing from Morocco to Spain. While the overall numbers of migrants reaching Europe by sea is down from the peak in 2015, Spain has witnessed a steady increase in sea arrivals that began more than a year ago and has surged in recent months. Through Saturday, 395 people were rescued from nine boats in the Strait of Gibraltar and the Alboran Sea, the two principal sea crossings to Spain, the Spanish coastguard said on Twitter. Two more people were rescued from a small boat on Sunday, it said. Spain, which for the first time in years has overtaken Italy as the preferred destination for refugees, has registered almost 21,000 migrants so far this year, almost more than in the whole of last year, according to figures compiled by the International Organisation for Migration. The mortality rate for the crossing from Morocco is around one in 70, IOM said, lower than that between Libya and Italy, which is one in 19.