diff -urNp debmirror_2.9.orig/debmirror debmirror_2.9/debmirror
--- debmirror_2.9.orig/debmirror	2011-07-28 21:56:43.000000000 +0900
+++ debmirror_2.9/debmirror	2011-10-23 01:53:44.000000000 +0900
@@ -411,6 +411,11 @@ debmirror cleanup is disabled when this
 Separate pool and snapshot cleanup utilities are available at
 http://code.google.com/p/debmarshal/source/browse/#svn/trunk/repository2
 
+=item B<--check-empty-mirror>, B<--no-check-empty-mirror>
+
+Controls whether empty mirror should be checked.
+The default is to check empty mirror.
+
 =back
 
 =head1 USING DEBMIRROR
@@ -574,6 +579,7 @@ our $debmarshal=0;
 our $slow_cpu=0;
 our $check_gpg=1;
 our $new_mirror=0;
+our $check_empty_mirror=1;
 my @errlog;
 my $HOME;
 ($HOME = $ENV{'HOME'}) or die "HOME not defined in environment!\n";
@@ -672,6 +678,7 @@ GetOptions('debug'                  => \
 	   'allow-dist-rename'      => \$allow_dist_rename,
 	   'debmarshal'             => \$debmarshal,
 	   'slow-cpu'               => \$slow_cpu,
+	   'check-empty-mirror!'    => \$check_empty_mirror,
 	   'help'                   => \$help,
 ) or usage;
 usage if $help;
@@ -1191,7 +1198,7 @@ SOURCE:  foreach my $file (@source_files
   }
 
   # Sanity check to avoid completely nuking a mirror.
-  if ($empty_mirror && ! $new_mirror) {
+  if ($check_empty_mirror && $empty_mirror && ! $new_mirror) {
     print "Errors:\n ".join(" ",@errlog) if (@errlog);
     die "No packages after parsing Packages and Sources files!\n";
   }