Four pregnant women and two babies were among a group of Somali illegal immigrants rescued by the Armed Forces of Malta early yesterday morning.

The 84 migrants, packed on a grey 10-metre long rubber dinghy, had sent a call for help through a satellite phone on Tuesday. The call came in through a chain of contacts. According to the AFM, it was received by a Somali living in Malta, who then contacted the Jesuit Refugee Service, which passed on the information to the UNHCR that, in turn, alerted the AFM.

Although the AFM managed to contact the migrants, an aerial search earlier proved unsuccessful.

A patrol boat spotted the overloaded dinghy late on Monday evening some 52 nautical miles south of Malta in the country's search and rescue area.

Rocked by force 5 winds, the dinghy was taking in water fast and the AFM had to rescue the migrants since they were in distress.

They were transferred to a patrol boat and brought to Malta yesterday morning. The rescue came just two weeks after an incident involving a group of Eritrean migrants caused a rift between Malta and Italy.

AFM commander Carmel Vassallo had than said that an army patrol boat had given the Eritreans biscuits, water and life jackets and followed them until they reached Lampedusa. He said the migrants were in good health and had not been at sea for very long. They had also refused to be rescued.