AN OVERJOYED Kent mother has found her two sons who were spirited abroad by their Iranian father nearly 10 years ago - thanks to an anonymous Good Samaritan on the Internet.

Having despaired of ever seeing them again, despite desperate attempts over the years to track them down in both Iran and America, Jackie Smith is now planning an emotional reunion with them in North Carolina.

The amazing breakthrough came when Jackie, from Rochester, received an unsigned letter from an Internet browser who traced her after reading how her youngest son Darius was trying to find her on the "Missing You" website.

She immediately rushed to an Internet cafe in Rochester where staff instructed her how to log on - and within hours, at a switch of a button, 18-year-old Darius had made contact with the mother he last saw at the schoolgates before Easter in 1993.

On screen were the words "Hello Mummy...I miss you so much. It has been a long time since I have seen you, but there has not been one day that has gone by that I haven't thought about you."

Since then Jackie, 42, has also been in touch with her oldest son Aaron, now aged 21, and living in the same town as his brother. The three of them are in contact either by e-mail or trans-Atlantic phone calls every day, piecing together their years apart.

Jackie, a barmaid who lives with her second husband in Rochester, has spoken of the moment she ripped open the envelope and read her son's name. She said: "I never gave up hope. I believed that one day they would want to find their mum. I sort of expected that there would be a knock on the door and there they would be with a family in tow - a bit like in magazines.

"I was initially in shock and then when I got Darius' response hours later, well, it was beyond belief."