diff --git a/biber-noreadonly.diff b/biber-noreadonly.diff
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..864b635
--- /dev/null
+++ b/biber-noreadonly.diff
@@ -0,0 +1,26 @@
+# Perl Readonly semantics changed with version 1.04. Readonly variable are
+# readonly across contexts and thus unregistration of namespaces fails if
+# the namespace variable is readoonly as the unregistration attempts to
+# modify the value
+diff -ru biblatex-biber-1.7.org/lib/Biber/Input/file/biblatexml.pm biblatex-biber-1.7/lib/Biber/Input/file/biblatexml.pm
+--- biblatex-biber-1.7.org/lib/Biber/Input/file/biblatexml.pm	2014-01-31 14:22:27.906441935 -0500
++++ biblatex-biber-1.7/lib/Biber/Input/file/biblatexml.pm	2014-01-31 14:25:36.144787433 -0500
+@@ -23,7 +23,6 @@
+ use List::AllUtils qw( uniq );
+ use XML::LibXML;
+ use XML::LibXML::Simple;
+-use Readonly;
+ use Data::Dump qw(dump);
+ use Unicode::Normalize;
+ use Unicode::GCString;
+@@ -32,8 +31,8 @@
+ my $logger = Log::Log4perl::get_logger('main');
+ my $orig_key_order = {};
+ 
+-Readonly::Scalar our $BIBLATEXML_NAMESPACE_URI => 'http://biblatex-biber.sourceforge.net/biblatexml';
+-Readonly::Scalar our $NS => 'bltx';
++our $BIBLATEXML_NAMESPACE_URI = 'http://biblatex-biber.sourceforge.net/biblatexml';
++our $NS = 'bltx';
+ 
+ # Determine handlers from data model
+ my $dm = Biber::Config->get_dm;
diff --git a/texlive.changes b/texlive.changes
index 7321705..3ea8b75 100644
--- a/texlive.changes
+++ b/texlive.changes
@@ -1,3 +1,13 @@
+-------------------------------------------------------------------
+Fri Jan 31 20:28:55 UTC 2014 - rschweikert@suse.com
+
+- The Perl Readonly module changes semantics with version 1.04 such that
+  Readonly variables are read only across contexts. Therefore using
+  a read only variable as an XML namespace context name triggers an
+  error when the context gets unregistered and an attempt is made to
+  reset the variable.
+  ~ add patch biber-noreadonly.diff to address the issue
+
 -------------------------------------------------------------------
 Mon Jan 13 11:15:56 UTC 2014 - werner@suse.de
 
diff --git a/texlive.spec b/texlive.spec
index 24306b1..3196b35 100644
--- a/texlive.spec
+++ b/texlive.spec
@@ -230,6 +230,8 @@ Patch41:        biber-certs.dif
 Patch42:        biblatex-encoding.dif
 # PATCH-FIX-UPSTREAM Make biber work without Data::diver perl module but autovivification
 Patch43:        biber-av.patch
+# PATCH-FIX-UPSTREAM deal with semantic change of Perl Readonly implementation in version 1.04
+Patch44:        biber-noreadonly.diff
 Prefix:         %{_bindir}
 
 %{expand: %%global options %(mktemp /tmp/texlive-opts.XXXXXXXX)}
@@ -2290,6 +2292,7 @@ pushd ../biblatex-biber-*
 %patch41 -p0 -b .ca
 %patch42 -p0 -b .en
 %patch43 -p1 -b .av
+%patch44 -p1 -b .ro
 popd
 %endif