In 1.11 and 1.10: ERROR: expected package `JuliaSyntaxHighlighting [dc6e5ff7]` to be registered

What is it about? I removed my ./Project.toml file just in case, then:

$ julia +1.11 --project=.

julia> using JSON
..
   Resolving package versions...
ERROR: expected package `JuliaSyntaxHighlighting [dc6e5ff7]` to be registered

also when adding it directly:

pkg> add JuliaSyntaxHighlighting
   Resolving package versions...
ERROR: expected package `JuliaSyntaxHighlighting [dc6e5ff7]` to be registered

I find old workaround (do not remove .julia, then at least move it):

I was able to solve this issue by deleting the registries folder within my .julia folder.

It likely works, but should such be needed? Why doesn’t Julia recover from this (what’s the least invasive fix/workaround)? Is it maybe “self-inflicted”, I often do CTRL-C while precompiling (to avoid OOM).

I checked some versions down to 1.6 same error as above, but in 1.5 different:

(pharaldsson) pkg> add Sentinel
┌ Error: Could not parse entry for `deps`
└ @ Pkg.Types /buildworker/worker/package_linux64/build/usr/share/julia/stdlib/v1.5/Pkg/src/manifest.jl:146
ERROR: MethodError: no method matching get(::Pair{String,Any}, ::String, ::Nothing)