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If, after building of Python, libexpat.so (library used by pyexpat module) has been broken/removed or pyexpat module has been broken/removed, then attempt of import of _elementtree module, which requires pyexpat module, will raise strange exceptions in Python 3.
These exceptions can be simulated by setting sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None.
$ python2.6 -c 'import sys; sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None; import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
ImportError: No module named pyexpat
$ python2.7 -c 'import sys; sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None; import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
ImportError: PyCapsule_Import could not import module "pyexpat"
$ python3.1 -c 'import sys; sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None; import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
SystemError: initialization of _elementtree raised unreported exception
$ python3.2 -c 'import sys; sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None; import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
SystemError: initialization of _elementtree raised unreported exception
$ python3.3 -c 'import sys; sys.modules["pyexpat"] = None; import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1286, in _find_and_load
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1253, in _find_and_load_unlocked
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 432, in _check_name_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 347, in set_package_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 360, in set_loader_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 870, in load_module
RuntimeError: cannot load dispatch table from pyexpat
I suggest to raise ImportError instead of SystemError or RuntimeError.
Third-party modules would rather use only 'except ImportError: pass' instead of 'except (ImportError, SystemError, RuntimeError): pass' when trying to optionally use e.g. xml.etree.cElementTree.
xml.etree.ElementTree in Python 3.3 also ignores only ImportError when trying to import _elementtree.

With the attached patch, with python3.3(trunk) I instead get: 
./python.exe -c 'import _elementtree'
Traceback (most recent call last):
 File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1294, in _find_and_load
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1261, in _find_and_load_unlocked
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 432, in _check_name_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 347, in set_package_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 360, in set_loader_wrapper
 File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 872, in load_module
ImportError: PyCapsule_Import could not import module "pyexpat"
(I have deleted pyexpat.so out of the build for the purposes of testing)
RuntimeError will continue to be raised in the case the version is wrong.

I agree, but this will now be delayed to 3.4, since it's not a bug-fixing change in functionality.
P.S. is there any way to create a test for it?

IMHO wrong exception could be treated as a bug, which could be fixed in 3.2 and 3.3.
Benjamin Peterson and Georg Brandl: What do you think?
> P.S. is there any way to create a test for it?
You can set sys.modules["pyexpat"]=None and test exception type when trying to import _elementtree.

IMHO, it can be fixed as people were relying on the old behavior.

I tried blocking the import of 'pyexpat' in a test by using test.support.import_fresh_module, placing 'pyexpat' into the blocked list, but it doesn't work (i.e. pyexpat, if it exists, is still imported)

Benjamin, what "old behavior"? Did it happen to raise ImportError historically and only recent changes made it RuntimeError? I'm not sure this is the case.

> Did it happen to raise ImportError historically and only recent
> changes made it RuntimeError? I'm not sure this is the case.
ImportError was raised in Python 2.

New changeset d896fd0a8ba7 by Eli Bendersky in branch '3.2':
ISsue #14988: restore Python 2's behavior of raising ImportError when unable to load pyexpat, instead of a SystemError/RuntimeError
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/d896fd0a8ba7
New changeset c8774ff45733 by Eli Bendersky in branch 'default':
Merge for #14988
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/c8774ff45733 

Committed fixes to raise ImportError in both Python 3.2 and 3.3
At the moment no test added because I'm having trouble using import_fresh_module to avoid re-importing of pyexpat in the etree tests (it gets imported anyway).

Can this issue be closed?