diff --git a/nominatim/api/core.py b/nominatim/api/core.py
index f975f44a..1c0c4423 100644
--- a/nominatim/api/core.py
+++ b/nominatim/api/core.py
@@ -101,6 +101,10 @@ class NominatimAPIAsync: #pylint: disable=too-many-instance-attributes
                 dburl = sa.engine.URL.create('sqlite+aiosqlite',
                                              database=params.get('dbname'))
 
+                if not ('NOMINATIM_DATABASE_RW' in self.config.environ
+                        and self.config.get_bool('DATABASE_RW')) \
+                   and not Path(params.get('dbname', '')).is_file():
+                    raise UsageError(f"SQlite database '{params.get('dbname')}' does not exist.")
             else:
                 dsn = self.config.get_database_params()
                 query = {k: v for k, v in dsn.items()
diff --git a/nominatim/tools/convert_sqlite.py b/nominatim/tools/convert_sqlite.py
index 16139c5f..3e584710 100644
--- a/nominatim/tools/convert_sqlite.py
+++ b/nominatim/tools/convert_sqlite.py
@@ -28,7 +28,8 @@ async def convert(project_dir: Path, outfile: Path, options: Set[str]) -> None:
 
     try:
         outapi = napi.NominatimAPIAsync(project_dir,
-                                        {'NOMINATIM_DATABASE_DSN': f"sqlite:dbname={outfile}"})
+                                        {'NOMINATIM_DATABASE_DSN': f"sqlite:dbname={outfile}",
+                                         'NOMINATIM_DATABASE_RW': '1'})
 
         try:
             async with api.begin() as src, outapi.begin() as dest: