LONDON (AP) — He’s won asylum in Ecuador, but Julian Assange is no closer to getting there.

The dramatic decision by the Latin American nation to identify the WikiLeaks founder as a political refugee is a symbolic boost for the embattled ex-hacker, but legal experts say that does little to help him avoid extradition to Sweden — and does much to drag Britain and Ecuador into an international faceoff.

“We’re at something of an impasse,” lawyer Rebecca Niblock said shortly after the news broke. “It’s not a question of law anymore. It’s a question of politics and diplomacy.”

The silver-haired Australian shot to international prominence in 2010 after he began publishing a huge trove of American diplomatic and military secrets — including a quarter million U.S. embassy cables that shed a harsh light on the backroom dealings of U.S. diplomats. Amid the ferment, two Swedish women accused him of sexual assault; Assange has been fighting extradition to Sweden ever since.

The convoluted saga took its latest twist on Thursday, when Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino announced that he had granted political asylum to Assange, who has been holed up at the small, coastal nation’s embassy since June 19. He said Ecuador was taking action because Assange faces a serious threat of unjust prosecution at the hands of U.S. officials.

That was a nod to the fears expressed by Assange and others that the Swedish sex case is merely the opening gambit in a Washingtonorchestrated plot to make him stand trial in the United States — something disputed by both by Swedish authorities and the women involved.

Patino said he’d tried to get guarantees from the Americans, the British, and the Swedes that Assange would not be extradited to the United States, but that all three had rebuffed him. If Assange were extradited to the U.S. “he would not have a fair trial, could be judged by special or military courts, and it’s not implausible that cruel and degrading treatment could be applied, that he could be condemned to life in prison, or the death penalty.”

Ecuador’s decision was warmly received by the 41- year-old Assange.