I had this problem when I copied applicationContext.xml and created new one called applicationContextAdditional.xml. I didn't try to find the reason, but both contained namespace
This happens when spring parses the <task:annotation-driven/> text twice in a config XML.
For me this was happening because both applicationContext-root.xml and applicationContext-where-annotation-driven-is-specififed.xml were imported in my WEB.xml in <context-param>section.
Leaving only applicationContext-root.xml in WEB.xml solved the issue.