diff --git a/changelog/unreleased/pull-21879 b/changelog/unreleased/pull-21879
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..a64a4900f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changelog/unreleased/pull-21879
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+Bugfix: prevent crash in mountpoint validation if mountpoint is inaccessible
+
+Since restic 0.19.0, the `mount` command validates a mountpoint before loading
+the repository. If restic was unable to stat the mountpoint, this would result
+in a crash. This has been fixed to correctly return an error instead.
+
+https://github.com/restic/restic/pull/21879
diff --git a/cmd/restic/cmd_mount.go b/cmd/restic/cmd_mount.go
index 2322e6769..010d1a7e0 100644
--- a/cmd/restic/cmd_mount.go
+++ b/cmd/restic/cmd_mount.go
@@ -227,6 +227,8 @@ func validateMountpoint(mountpoint string, gopts global.Options) error {
 	stat, err := os.Stat(mountpoint)
 	if errors.Is(err, os.ErrNotExist) {
 		return errors.Fatal(fmt.Sprintf("mountpoint %s does not exist", mountpoint))
+	} else if err != nil {
+		return errors.Fatal(fmt.Sprintf("mountpoint %s is inaccessible: %v", mountpoint, err))
 	} else if !stat.IsDir() {
 		return errors.Fatal(fmt.Sprintf("mountpoint %s is not a directory", mountpoint))
 	}