diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 7f3316eb69..c728670b28 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,10 @@
+2008-01-10  Sven Neumann  <sven@gimp.org>
+
+	* app/widgets/gimpuimanager.c (gimp_ui_manager_ui_popup):
+	gracefully deal with a NULL return value from
+	gtk_ui_manager_get_widget(). This happens when the XML menu
+	definitions are not found.
+
 2008-01-10  Sven Neumann  <sven@gimp.org>
 
 	* plug-ins/pygimp/plug-ins/gimpcons.py: fixed spelling of GIMP.
diff --git a/app/widgets/gimpuimanager.c b/app/widgets/gimpuimanager.c
index f65e372455..808285670e 100644
--- a/app/widgets/gimpuimanager.c
+++ b/app/widgets/gimpuimanager.c
@@ -588,6 +588,9 @@ gimp_ui_manager_ui_popup (GimpUIManager        *manager,
   if (GTK_IS_MENU_ITEM (widget))
     widget = gtk_menu_item_get_submenu (GTK_MENU_ITEM (widget));
 
+  if (! widget)
+    return;
+
   g_return_if_fail (GTK_IS_MENU (widget));
 
   if (! position_func)