Jolie adopts Vietnamese boy, her fourth child

U.S. actress Angelina Jolie (2nd L) leaves the Tam Binh orphanage with her previously adopted son Cambodian-born Maddox in Ho Chi Minh City March 15, 2007.[Rueters]

Hollywood star Angelina Jolie (L) sits in a car on the way from the airport to a hotel in Ho Chi Minh City March 14, 2007. [Reuters]

HO CHI MINH CITY - American movie star Angelina Jolie adopted her fourth child on Thursday, a Vietnamese boy from a Ho Chi Minh City orphanage.

Government officials said the boy was renamed Pax Thien Jolie and is almost three-and-a-half years old.

The adoption will be final once U.S. embassy officials in Hanoi approve the paperwork. Jolie and Vietnamese officials have already signed adoption documents in Ho Chi Minh City.

"Everything went really well. It was a successful event this morning," said Nguyen Van Trung, director of the Tam Binh orphanage in the city, the communist-run Southeast Asian country's largest urban area with 8 million people.

"All she needs to do now is to travel to Hanoi to get the travel paperwork from the U.S. embassy for the boy."

Senior officials said Jolie's adoption had been speeded up, partly due to her celebrity status.

The child had been registered as Pham Quang Sang at the orphanage. Trung said the boy had been abandoned at birth at a local hospital and has been at the orphanage since 2003.

Jolie took the boy with her to the Justice Department building in the city centre to sign the adoption documents. Her car left half an hour later.