diff --git a/Include/errcode.h b/Include/errcode.h
index 985911eea4f..becec80c8ac 100644
--- a/Include/errcode.h
+++ b/Include/errcode.h
@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@ extern "C" {
 #define E_DECODE	22	/* Error in decoding into Unicode */
 #define E_EOFS		23	/* EOF in triple-quoted string */
 #define E_EOLS		24	/* EOL in single-quoted string */
+#define E_LINECONT	25	/* Unexpected characters after a line continuation */
 
 #ifdef __cplusplus
 }
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index d0a8118caed..baf344544c9 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -10,6 +10,9 @@ What's New in Python 2.5 alpha 1?
 Core and builtins
 -----------------
 
+- Patch #802188: Report characters after line continuation character 
+  ('\') with a specific error message.
+
 - Bug #723201: Raise a TypeError for passing bad objects to 'L' format.
 
 - Bug #1124295: the __name__ attribute of file objects was
diff --git a/Parser/tokenizer.c b/Parser/tokenizer.c
index 8fc2c267dea..1884d011e89 100644
--- a/Parser/tokenizer.c
+++ b/Parser/tokenizer.c
@@ -1413,7 +1413,7 @@ tok_get(register struct tok_state *tok, char **p_start, char **p_end)
 	if (c == '\\') {
 		c = tok_nextc(tok);
 		if (c != '\n') {
-			tok->done = E_TOKEN;
+			tok->done = E_LINECONT;
 			tok->cur = tok->inp;
 			return ERRORTOKEN;
 		}
diff --git a/Python/pythonrun.c b/Python/pythonrun.c
index e9f4765a1e1..6d691655cca 100644
--- a/Python/pythonrun.c
+++ b/Python/pythonrun.c
@@ -1484,6 +1484,9 @@ err_input(perrdetail *err)
 			msg = "unknown decode error";
 		break;
 	}
+	case E_LINECONT:
+		msg = "unexpected character after line continuation character";
+		break;
 	default:
 		fprintf(stderr, "error=%d\n", err->error);
 		msg = "unknown parsing error";