diff --git a/CHANGES.txt b/CHANGES.txt
index 7ea50ec80fa..03fd1916d8d 100644
--- a/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/CHANGES.txt
@@ -60,6 +60,9 @@ Trunk (unreleased changes)
     HADOOP-7151. Document need for stable hashCode() in WritableComparable.
     (Dmitriy V. Ryaboy via todd)
 
+    HADOOP-7112. Issue a warning when GenericOptionsParser libjars are not on
+    local filesystem. (tomwhite)
+
   OPTIMIZATIONS
 
   BUG FIXES
diff --git a/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/GenericOptionsParser.java b/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/GenericOptionsParser.java
index 4eb280d9d4d..5189e8e0535 100644
--- a/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/GenericOptionsParser.java
+++ b/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/util/GenericOptionsParser.java
@@ -342,6 +342,9 @@ public class GenericOptionsParser {
       Path tmp = new Path(file);
       if (tmp.getFileSystem(conf).equals(FileSystem.getLocal(conf))) {
         cp.add(FileSystem.getLocal(conf).pathToFile(tmp).toURI().toURL());
+      } else {
+        LOG.warn("The libjars file " + tmp + " is not on the local " +
+          "filesystem. Ignoring.");
       }
     }
     return cp.toArray(new URL[0]);