diff --git a/CHANGELOG b/CHANGELOG
index 95d1355071..444d43b75f 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG
+++ b/CHANGELOG
@@ -17,6 +17,8 @@ git-annex (6.20161211) UNRELEASED; urgency=medium
   * p2p: --link no longer takes a remote name, instead the --name
     option can be used.
   * Debian: Build webapp on armel.
+  * Linux standalone: Improve generation of locale definition files,
+    supporting locales such as, en_GB.UTF-8.
 
  -- Joey Hess <id@joeyh.name>  Sun, 11 Dec 2016 21:29:51 -0400
 
diff --git a/doc/bugs/Linux_standalone__39__s_metadata_--batch_can__39__t_parse_UTF-8/comment_1_1765400777911cc61eb591b76c84ae89._comment b/doc/bugs/Linux_standalone__39__s_metadata_--batch_can__39__t_parse_UTF-8/comment_1_1765400777911cc61eb591b76c84ae89._comment
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..cf591d65ed
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/bugs/Linux_standalone__39__s_metadata_--batch_can__39__t_parse_UTF-8/comment_1_1765400777911cc61eb591b76c84ae89._comment
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+[[!comment format=mdwn
+ username="joey"
+ subject="""comment 1"""
+ date="2016-12-19T20:37:56Z"
+ content="""
+JSON uses  a UTF-8 encoding. So the usual hack used in git-annex
+of bypassing the system locale and essentially reading data as binary can't
+work for --json. 
+
+So, I think you need to be using a unicode locale, which is properly set up
+in order to use --json. And, the data fed in via --json needs to actually
+be encoded as unicode and not some other encoding.
+
+runshell was recently changed to bypass using the system locales, it
+includes its own locale data and attempts to generate a locale definition
+file for the locale. The code that did that was failing to notice that
+en_GB.UTF-8 was a UTF-8 locale (en_GB.utf8 would work though), which
+explains why the locale is not set inside runshell
+(git-annex.linux/git-annex is a script that uses runshell). I've corrected
+that problem, and verified it fixes the problem you reported.
+"""]]
diff --git a/standalone/linux/skel/runshell b/standalone/linux/skel/runshell
index d6bec7aa38..a4578eb1b2 100755
--- a/standalone/linux/skel/runshell
+++ b/standalone/linux/skel/runshell
@@ -132,7 +132,7 @@ for localeenv in "$LANG" "$LANGUAGE" "$LC_CTYPE" "$LC_NUMERIC" "$LC_TIME" \
 	if [ "$localeenv" != "$lastlocaleenv" ]; then
 		lastlocaleenv="$localeenv"
 		if [ ! -d "$base/locales/$localeenv" ]; then
-			if [ "${localeenv##[!.]*.}" = "utf8" ]; then
+			if [ "${localeenv##[!.]*.}" = "utf8" ] || [ "${localeenv##[!.]*.}" = "UTF-8" ]; then
 				(
 					rm -rf "$base/locales/$localeenv.new.$$" &&
 					mkdir -p "$base/locales/$localeenv.new.$$" &&