Leoni's Agent Orange campaign

Hollywood star Tea Leoni, visiting Vietnam as a Unicef ambassador, has kicked off a campaign to raise awareness about the plight of children suffering disabilities linked to Agent Orange.

Leoni visited Vietnamese families and health centres with children suffering birth defects linked to dioxin, the highly toxic chemical in the defoliant that the US military sprayed during the Vietnam war.

"The public, I think, is not aware of some of the specific dioxin issues," the 42-year-old star of Deep Impact and Jurassic Park 3 told a Hanoi media briefing at the end of her five-day visit.