diff --git a/django/core/validators.py b/django/core/validators.py
index dad0a7924f..27a42c4cda 100644
--- a/django/core/validators.py
+++ b/django/core/validators.py
@@ -81,7 +81,7 @@ class URLValidator(RegexValidator):
                 "User-Agent": self.user_agent,
             }
             try:
-                req = urllib2.Request(url, None, headers)
+                req = urllib2.Request(url.encode('utf-8'), None, headers)
                 u = urllib2.urlopen(req)
             except ValueError:
                 raise ValidationError(_(u'Enter a valid URL.'), code='invalid')
diff --git a/tests/regressiontests/forms/tests/fields.py b/tests/regressiontests/forms/tests/fields.py
index f198e6c796..a9272bed2a 100644
--- a/tests/regressiontests/forms/tests/fields.py
+++ b/tests/regressiontests/forms/tests/fields.py
@@ -567,6 +567,8 @@ class FieldsTests(TestCase):
             f.clean('http://google.com/we-love-microsoft.html') # good domain, bad page
         except ValidationError, e:
             self.assertEqual("[u'This URL appears to be a broken link.']", str(e))
+        # UTF-8 char in path
+        self.assertEqual(u'http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/T\xfcr', f.clean(u'http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/T\xfcr'))
 
     def test_urlfield_4(self):
         f = URLField(verify_exists=True, required=False)