diff --git a/CHANGES b/CHANGES
index deec9e6..8bc18b2 100644
--- a/CHANGES
+++ b/CHANGES
@@ -8,6 +8,7 @@
   (Thank to olt(at)bogosoft(dot)com).
 * Clear cyclic references in the parser and the emitter
   (Thank to kristjan(at)ccpgames(dot)com).
+* Dropped support for Python 2.3 and 2.4.
 
 3.09 (2009-08-31)
 -----------------
diff --git a/announcement.msg b/announcement.msg
index 8cb814c..e94b580 100644
--- a/announcement.msg
+++ b/announcement.msg
@@ -19,6 +19,8 @@
 * Clear cyclic references in the parser and the emitter
   (Thank to kristjan(at)ccpgames(dot)com).
 * LibYAML bindings are rebuilt with the latest version of Cython.
+* Dropped support for Python 2.3 and 2.4; currently supported versions
+  are 2.5 to 3.2.
 
 
 Resources
diff --git a/lib/yaml/constructor.py b/lib/yaml/constructor.py
index 081d78a..635faac 100644
--- a/lib/yaml/constructor.py
+++ b/lib/yaml/constructor.py
@@ -7,11 +7,6 @@
 
 import datetime
 
-try:
-    set
-except NameError:
-    from sets import Set as set
-
 import binascii, re, sys, types
 
 class ConstructorError(MarkedYAMLError):
@@ -502,11 +497,7 @@
             raise ConstructorError("while constructing a Python object", mark,
                     "expected non-empty name appended to the tag", mark)
         if u'.' in name:
-            # Python 2.4 only
-            #module_name, object_name = name.rsplit('.', 1)
-            items = name.split('.')
-            object_name = items.pop()
-            module_name = '.'.join(items)
+            module_name, object_name = name.rsplit('.', 1)
         else:
             module_name = '__builtin__'
             object_name = name
diff --git a/lib/yaml/reader.py b/lib/yaml/reader.py
index 1e7a4db..3249e6b 100644
--- a/lib/yaml/reader.py
+++ b/lib/yaml/reader.py
@@ -21,41 +21,6 @@
 
 import codecs, re
 
-# Unfortunately, codec functions in Python 2.3 does not support the `finish`
-# arguments, so we have to write our own wrappers.
-
-try:
-    codecs.utf_8_decode('', 'strict', False)
-    from codecs import utf_8_decode, utf_16_le_decode, utf_16_be_decode
-
-except TypeError:
-
-    def utf_16_le_decode(data, errors, finish=False):
-        if not finish and len(data) % 2 == 1:
-            data = data[:-1]
-        return codecs.utf_16_le_decode(data, errors)
-
-    def utf_16_be_decode(data, errors, finish=False):
-        if not finish and len(data) % 2 == 1:
-            data = data[:-1]
-        return codecs.utf_16_be_decode(data, errors)
-
-    def utf_8_decode(data, errors, finish=False):
-        if not finish:
-            # We are trying to remove a possible incomplete multibyte character
-            # from the suffix of the data.
-            # The first byte of a multi-byte sequence is in the range 0xc0 to 0xfd.
-            # All further bytes are in the range 0x80 to 0xbf.
-            # UTF-8 encoded UCS characters may be up to six bytes long.
-            count = 0
-            while count < 5 and count < len(data)   \
-                    and '\x80' <= data[-count-1] <= '\xBF':
-                count -= 1
-            if count < 5 and count < len(data)  \
-                    and '\xC0' <= data[-count-1] <= '\xFD':
-                data = data[:-count-1]
-        return codecs.utf_8_decode(data, errors)
-
 class ReaderError(YAMLError):
 
     def __init__(self, name, position, character, encoding, reason):
@@ -159,13 +124,13 @@
             self.update_raw()
         if not isinstance(self.raw_buffer, unicode):
             if self.raw_buffer.startswith(codecs.BOM_UTF16_LE):
-                self.raw_decode = utf_16_le_decode
+                self.raw_decode = codecs.utf_16_le_decode
                 self.encoding = 'utf-16-le'
             elif self.raw_buffer.startswith(codecs.BOM_UTF16_BE):
-                self.raw_decode = utf_16_be_decode
+                self.raw_decode = codecs.utf_16_be_decode
                 self.encoding = 'utf-16-be'
             else:
-                self.raw_decode = utf_8_decode
+                self.raw_decode = codecs.utf_8_decode
                 self.encoding = 'utf-8'
         self.update(1)
 
diff --git a/lib/yaml/representer.py b/lib/yaml/representer.py
index f5606ec..5f4fc70 100644
--- a/lib/yaml/representer.py
+++ b/lib/yaml/representer.py
@@ -7,11 +7,6 @@
 
 import datetime
 
-try:
-    set
-except NameError:
-    from sets import Set as set
-
 import sys, copy_reg, types
 
 class RepresenterError(YAMLError):