Samuel, 2, has been in Ukraine since birth because of legal issues

LODEVE, France - Baby Samuel's room has been waiting for him for more than two years. The crib stands empty in the corner. Above it hangs a mobile in the shape of a friendly dragon. On the dresser a toy bus stands idle.

Samuel Ghilain, born 2 years and 3 months ago to a surrogate mother in Ukraine, has so far been unable to leave that country. Because of legal hurdles, he has not been able to join his parents - a married pair of Belgian men who now live in this town in the south of France, where they moved to give their baby a quiet childhood.

Instead, he's in a Ukrainian orphanage.

The long and painful separation now seems about to come to an end. After more than two years of denying Samuel a passport, the Belgian Foreign Ministry issued him one on Monday. He should arrive in Brussels within days.

The ministry's decision came after a Belgian court finally issued a ruling in the couple's favor last week, saying bureaucrats had committed numerous errors.

Belgium is largely silent on surrogate motherhood and any rights a child born that way might have, leaving the way open to different interpretations. His parents' sexuality poses no direct legal bar to bringing Samuel to Belgium. But his parents - Laurent Ghilain, a 27-year-old fitness trainer, and Peter Meurrens, a 37-year-old cardiologist - say that some bureaucrats in both countries were anti-gay.

They say the Belgian official who worked hardest to prevent the baby from being allowed into the country implied in court that, because they were gay, they could not be good parents.

While victory appears to be at hand, Ghilain and Meurrens have been told so many times their problems were nearly solved that it frightens them to have hope.

"For the last two years, almost every month there was somebody telling us ... it will take only one week and then he will be with you," Meurrens said.

But he added, "finally, I am starting to believe I will see him in a few days".

Ghilain said it has been a difficult journey.

"We were constantly making giant steps forward, and each time, within a minute, there were three steps backward to make us come back to earth," Ghilain said. "So it really was an emotional yo-yo."

Ghilain and Meurrens met in the hospital in Brussels where they both worked, and fell in love.

Both wanted children and, failing to find a suitable surrogate mother in Belgium, they dealt with an agency in Ukraine they thought was reliable. They went there in November 2007 to choose the eggs, based on information about the donors. Meurrens joked that his main criterion was that he wanted a child that looked like him as well as Ghilain, who is the biological father.

The pair consulted Belgian authorities, who told them there would normally not be a problem. So on March 10, 2008, two embryos were implanted in the surrogate mother.

Then the couple prepared for a family. On Sept 13, 2008, in Brussels City Hall, they got married.

Seeking a quieter life for their child-to-be, they moved to Lodeve. It is a quiet town surrounded by hills and vineyards, full of ancient stone houses where laundry flaps from the balconies - a town where old men sit on benches, talking about life, and the gentle whooshing of a small river is ever-present.

Associated Press