Ukraine crisis: UK couple home with Kyiv-born surrogate baby

Ben Garratt and his wife Alice had to obtain emergency travel documents for newborn son Raphael

A British couple from north London who lived in Ukraine for seven weeks to have a surrogate baby have managed to return home after securing emergency travel documents for their son.

Ben Garratt and his wife Alice moved to Kyiv at the end of December after the surrogate birth of baby Raphael.

Despite the Foreign Office urging Britons to immediately leave Ukraine on 11 February, the couple remained.

It was a "huge relief" to arrive home in Kilburn on Tuesday, Mr Garratt said.

The couple had needed to provide proof of their son's British citizenship to get an emergency travel document, a more urgent alternative to a passport.

At the weekend, Mr Garratt had said the family's situation was "getting frustrating because we're being told by the UK government to leave the country... and we still don't have the document we need".

Ben Garratt had said at the weekend it was "frustrating" to have to wait for travel documents amid the crisis

He said at the time he had been asked to attend a two-hour interview at the passport office in Kyiv on Wednesday, which had worried him amid urgent warnings from governments around the world that made them "want to get out".

"It's great to be home," said Mr Garratt, who works in stakeholder engagement at London North Eastern Railway.

"It's a huge relief, given the situation with Russia, to be away from that.

"And also great to be near our family and friends - all of Rafi's grandparents were at our house when we got back, playing with him."

Raphael was born thanks to the "very different surrogacy laws" in Ukraine that allow for a swifter IVF and surrogacy process, Mr Garratt said.