diff --git a/bundles/org.eclipse.osgi/supplement/src/org/eclipse/osgi/util/NLS.java b/bundles/org.eclipse.osgi/supplement/src/org/eclipse/osgi/util/NLS.java
index 2895530f68b..49bdc89fe1b 100644
--- a/bundles/org.eclipse.osgi/supplement/src/org/eclipse/osgi/util/NLS.java
+++ b/bundles/org.eclipse.osgi/supplement/src/org/eclipse/osgi/util/NLS.java
@@ -13,10 +13,14 @@
  *******************************************************************************/
 package org.eclipse.osgi.util;
 
+import java.io.BufferedReader;
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.InputStream;
+import java.io.InputStreamReader;
 import java.lang.reflect.Field;
 import java.lang.reflect.Modifier;
+import java.nio.charset.Charset;
+import java.nio.charset.StandardCharsets;
 import java.security.AccessController;
 import java.security.PrivilegedAction;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
@@ -141,18 +145,49 @@ public static String bind(String message, Object[] bindings) {
 	 *
 	 * @param baseName the base name of a fully qualified message properties file.
 	 * @param clazz the class where the constants will exist
+	 * @param charset the charset for the given properties file
 	 */
-	public static void initializeMessages(final String baseName, final Class<?> clazz) {
+	public static void initializeMessages(final String baseName, final Class<?> clazz, final Charset charset) {
 		if (System.getSecurityManager() == null) {
-			load(baseName, clazz);
+			load(baseName, clazz, charset);
 			return;
 		}
 		AccessController.doPrivileged((PrivilegedAction<Void>) () -> {
-			load(baseName, clazz);
+			load(baseName, clazz, charset);
 			return null;
 		});
 	}
 
+	/**
+	 * Initialize the given class with the values from the message properties specified by the
+	 * base name.  The base name specifies a fully qualified base name to a message properties file,
+	 * including the package where the message properties file is located.  The class loader of the
+	 * specified class will be used to load the message properties resources. Values from the file
+	 * are decoded into characters using the {@link StandardCharsets#UTF_8 UTF-8} {@link Charset charset}.
+	 * <p> This method works as if invoking it were equivalent to evaluating the
+	 * expression:
+	 * <blockquote>{@link
+	 * #initializeMessages(String, Class, Charset)
+	 * NLS.initializeMessages(path, clazz, StandardCharsets.UTF_8)
+	 * }</blockquote>
+	 * <p>
+	 * For example, if the locale is set to en_US and <code>org.eclipse.example.nls.messages</code>
+	 * is used as the base name then the following resources will be searched using the class
+	 * loader of the specified class:
+	 * </p>
+	 * <pre>
+	 *   org/eclipse/example/nls/messages_en_US.properties
+	 *   org/eclipse/example/nls/messages_en.properties
+	 *   org/eclipse/example/nls/messages.properties
+	 * </pre>
+	 *
+	 * @param baseName the base name of a fully qualified message properties file.
+	 * @param clazz the class where the constants will exist
+	 */
+	public static void initializeMessages(final String baseName, final Class<?> clazz) {
+		initializeMessages(baseName, clazz, StandardCharsets.UTF_8);
+	}
+
 	/*
 	 * Perform the string substitution on the given message with the specified args.
 	 * See the class comment for exact details.
@@ -321,9 +356,9 @@ private static void computeMissingMessages(String bundleName, Class<?> clazz, Ma
 	}
 
 	/*
-	 * Load the given resource bundle using the specified class loader.
+	 * Load the given resource bundle in the specified charset using the specified class loader.
 	 */
-	static void load(final String bundleName, Class<?> clazz) {
+	static void load(final String bundleName, Class<?> clazz, Charset charset) {
 		long start = System.currentTimeMillis();
 		final Field[] fieldArray = clazz.getDeclaredFields();
 		ClassLoader loader = clazz.getClassLoader();
@@ -347,7 +382,12 @@ static void load(final String bundleName, Class<?> clazz) {
 				continue;
 			try {
 				final MessagesProperties properties = new MessagesProperties(fields, bundleName, isAccessible);
-				properties.load(input);
+				if (charset == StandardCharsets.ISO_8859_1) {
+					// preserves legacy behavior while also serving as a fast-path
+					properties.load(input);
+				} else {
+					properties.load(new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(input, charset)));
+				}
 			} catch (IOException e) {
 				log(SEVERITY_ERROR, "Error loading " + variant, e); //$NON-NLS-1$
 			} finally {