upgrade to maven-release-plugin 2.4.1 and use LANG='en_US.UTF-8'
diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index f7d2e74..82da43a 100755
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -207,9 +207,8 @@
         <plugin>
           <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
           <artifactId>maven-release-plugin</artifactId>
-          <!-- we have to stick to this version unti the below issue is resolved -->
-          <!-- see http://jira.codehaus.org/browse/MRELEASE-695 -->
-          <version>2.1</version>
+          <!-- see http://jira.codehaus.org/browse/MRELEASE-812 -->
+          <version>2.4.1</version>
           <configuration>
 	        <localCheckout>true</localCheckout>
             <pushChanges>false</pushChanges>