diff --git a/bash.changes b/bash.changes
index 82f7259b..6b8d4249 100644
--- a/bash.changes
+++ b/bash.changes
@@ -1,3 +1,8 @@
+-------------------------------------------------------------------
+Fri Dec  8 06:12:43 UTC 2017 - werner@suse.de
+
+- Enable multibyte characters by default 
+
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
 Mon Sep 25 09:13:32 UTC 2017 - werner@suse.de
 
diff --git a/bash.spec b/bash.spec
index 4f34b5a8..935dade2 100644
--- a/bash.spec
+++ b/bash.spec
@@ -534,6 +534,7 @@ popd
 	--enable-command-timing		\
 	--enable-disabled-builtins	\
 	--disable-strict-posix-default	\
+	--enable-multibyte		\
 	--enable-separate-helpfiles=%{_datadir}/bash/helpfiles \
 	$READLINE
   profilecflags=CFLAGS="$CFLAGS"