Angelina Jolie arrives in Vietnam to collect new son

Mar 14, 2007, 18:44 GMT

File photo showing Angelina Jolie, (C), listening to Sikh children playing religious music at the Khalsa Diwan Welfare Society, an organization run by Afghan refugees of the Sikh faith for other refugees, in New Delhi, India. Jolie arrived in Ho Chi Minh City late Wednesday, apparently to pick up the three-year-old Vietnamese boy she has arranged to adopt from an orphanage. EPA/UNHCR / K. MCKINSEY

Hanoi - Hollywood diva Angelina Jolie arrived in Ho Chi Minh City late Wednesday, apparently to pick up the three-year-old Vietnamese boy she has arranged to adopt from an orphanage.

Jolie arrived at around 10 pm local time and was photographed with her adopted Cambodian-born son Maddox, and was then seen leaving Tan Nhat Son airport by car.

She arrived an hour later at the exclusive Park Hyatt Hotel, where a security guard confirmed her entourage had arrived through an employees' entrance

'Oh, the movie star?' said one Vietnamese employee at the hotel. 'You just missed her arriving - but it's a big secret.'

The three-year-old Vietnamese boy Jolie is adopting is expected to be transferred to Jolie's care in a ceremony Thursday or Friday.

Vietnamese officials confirmed that the adoption formalities had been completed by Wednesday, and that there would be a 'handover ceremony' with the Ho Chi Minh People's Committee and Justice Department officials.

Jolie had already visited the orphanage last November with partner Brad Pitt. The boy will be the third adopted child in the fast- growing Jolie-Pitt brood, which also includes the Hollywood couple's nine-month-old biological daughter, Shiloh.

Jolie filed adoption forms with the International Adoption Department under Vietnam's Ministry of Justice two weeks ago, according to Vu Duc Long, director of the department. Pitt's name is not on the application, according to Long.

The boy, whose name is being withheld, lives at Tam Binh Orphanage in Ho Chi Minh City, where the couple spent Thanksgiving last November passing out toys to the children.

The Vietnamese-born future Jolie-Pitt will be joining an international family of five-year-old Maddox, Zahara, aged two, from Ethiopia, as well as baby Shiloh, who was born in Namibia last May.