diff --git a/arangod/RestServer/ArangoServer.cpp b/arangod/RestServer/ArangoServer.cpp
index b066688fa4..79ac409154 100644
--- a/arangod/RestServer/ArangoServer.cpp
+++ b/arangod/RestServer/ArangoServer.cpp
@@ -201,9 +201,9 @@ ArangoServer::ArangoServer (int argc, char** argv)
 
   // set working directory and database directory
   _workingDirectory = "/var/tmp";
-#ifdef TRI_HAVE_ICU  
+
   _defaultLanguage = Utf8Helper::DefaultUtf8Helper.getCollatorLanguage();
-#endif
+
 }
 
 ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
@@ -318,9 +318,7 @@ void ArangoServer::buildApplicationServer () {
     ("pid-file", &_pidFile, "pid-file in daemon mode")
     ("supervisor", "starts a supervisor and runs as daemon")
     ("working-directory", &_workingDirectory, "working directory in daemon mode")
-#ifdef TRI_HAVE_ICU
     ("default-language", &_defaultLanguage, "ISO-639 language code")
-#endif  
   ;
   
   // .............................................................................
@@ -395,8 +393,6 @@ void ArangoServer::buildApplicationServer () {
     exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
   }
   
-
-#ifdef TRI_HAVE_ICU  
   // .............................................................................
   // set language of default collator
   // .............................................................................
@@ -414,8 +410,6 @@ void ArangoServer::buildApplicationServer () {
   else {
     LOGGER_INFO << "using default language '" << Utf8Helper::DefaultUtf8Helper.getCollatorLanguage() << "'" ;        
   }
-#endif  
-
  
   // .............................................................................
   // disable access to the HTML admin interface