Jolie's son wanted sister
2005-07-08 07:29
Addis Ababa - Screen siren Angelina Jolie has told People magazine that she and her son Maddox were "very happy to have a new addition to our family".
She said that after a trip to Ethiopia earlier this year Maddox fell "in love with Africa, so he has been asking for an African brother or sister".
Jolie and her newly adopted Ethiopian child flew out of Ethiopia late on Thursday with heart-throb Brad Pitt and her son in tow.
Having collected the girl from an Addis Ababa orphanage a week after securing the necessary approval, Jolie, Pitt and her two adopted children, son Maddox and new daughter Zahara Marley, left Addis Ababa's Bole International Airport in a private jet, witnesses and officials said.
"They have left tonight," said Tesfaye Behru, an official with the Wide Horizons agency which arranged the adoption, after witnesses reported the foursome had boarded a plane that took off around 18:10 GMT.
"They were all three with the little baby," Tesfaye told AFP, declining to discuss further details of the departure or the transfer of the child from the orphanage to the 30-year-old actress.
Jolie and her son Maddox, whom she adopted in 2002, along with Pitt had arrived in the Ethiopian capital on Wednesday to pick up the latest addition to the actresses family and kept an extremely low profile in Addis Ababa.
They declined or avoided attempts by reporters to speak with them about Jolie's adoption of the less than one-year-old girl.
Shortly before their arrival, Ethiopian officials had confirmed a report in the online edition of the US celebrity magazine People which said that Jolie had adopted the baby girl.
They said Jolie had completed the necessary paperwork and had been approved to adopt the infant during a visit that she and Pitt, who travelled to Ethiopia in April to visit HIV/Aids projects, had made to Addis Ababa last week.
Jolie and Pitt, who star in the current hit Mr & Mrs Smith, have brushed aside speculation about a relationship despite being seen and repeatedly photographed together on various continents over the past two months.
The Ethiopian officials who confirmed the adoption said that Jolie had adopted the girl on her own, signing the papers alone and listing her marital status as divorced.