diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index df3571df..b7d8add4 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
+  - updated html_select_date's year_as_text-feature to be xhtml compliant
+    (Mark West, messju)
   - fix handling of selected month html_select_date (Yuri Weseman, messju)
 
 Version 2.6.9 (Mar 31, 2005)
diff --git a/libs/plugins/function.html_select_date.php b/libs/plugins/function.html_select_date.php
index d81b8906..243dbc9e 100644
--- a/libs/plugins/function.html_select_date.php
+++ b/libs/plugins/function.html_select_date.php
@@ -253,7 +253,7 @@ function smarty_function_html_select_date($params, &$smarty)
             if (null !== $year_extra){
                 $year_result .= ' ' . $year_extra;
             }
-            $year_result .= '>';
+            $year_result .= ' />';
         } else {
             $years = range((int)$start_year, (int)$end_year);
             if ($reverse_years) {