Six people died and a total of 1,164 people were rescued during operations to save stricken migrant boats in the Mediterranean today, Italy's coastguard said.<br/><br/>Vessels operated by the coastguard, the EU's naval operation EUNAVFOR MED and the Italian navy were deployed along with the Aquarius to help migrants on six rubber dinghies and one larger wooden boat that had got into trouble off Libya. <br/><br/>In this year, there has been a huge number of migrants arriving at Italy's southern ports with more than<br/>173,000 registered by the interior ministry, till the start of last week.<br/><br/>