diff --git a/src/calibre/utils/genshi/core.py b/src/calibre/utils/genshi/core.py
index aaa10edc82..d64860f086 100644
--- a/src/calibre/utils/genshi/core.py
+++ b/src/calibre/utils/genshi/core.py
@@ -491,7 +491,9 @@ class Markup(unicode):
         if hasattr(text, '__html__'):
             return Markup(text.__html__())
 
-        text = unicode(text).replace('&', '&') \
+        if isinstance(text, str):
+            text = text.decode('utf-8', 'replace')
+        text = text.replace('&', '&') \
                             .replace('<', '&lt;') \
                             .replace('>', '&gt;')
         if quotes:
diff --git a/src/calibre/web/feeds/news.py b/src/calibre/web/feeds/news.py
index 9cc7139b28..33f24b5a05 100644
--- a/src/calibre/web/feeds/news.py
+++ b/src/calibre/web/feeds/news.py
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ Defines various abstract base classes that can be subclassed to create powerful
 __docformat__ = "restructuredtext en"
 
 
-import logging, os, cStringIO, time, traceback, re, urlparse
+import logging, os, cStringIO, time, traceback, re, urlparse, sys
 from collections import defaultdict
 from functools import partial
 
@@ -533,6 +533,9 @@ class BasicNewsRecipe(object, LoggingInterface):
                             self.image_map[feed.image_url] = img
                         except:
                             pass
+            if isinstance(feed.image_url, str):
+                feed.image_url = feed.image_url.decode(sys.getfilesystemencoding(), 'strict')
+                
                 
         templ = templates.FeedTemplate()
         return templ.generate(feed, self.description_limiter).render(doctype='xhtml')