This was fixed by commit 900665121b5ecaf606b6bb2bcf350d7f2af158ee Author: Tim Bunce <Tim.Bunce@pobox.com> Date: Sun Feb 21 17:39:55 2010 +0100 [perl #72942] Can't perform unicode operations in Safe compartment The fix is to make Safe load utf8.pm (and ensure utf8_heavy.pl is run) so it can always share utf8::SWASHNEW. -- Karl Williamson