[ic] utf8 mysql problem

[marco]

Debian GNU/Linux 9
Interchange V5.10.0
mysqld 10.1.26-MariaDB-0+deb9u1

With italian accented characters mysql store and return wrong chars.
Try to change charater set to mysql scheme (all db) and table from 
latin1 to utf8, also put metatags on the input form page:
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />

but the only way i find to store and retrieve accented characters is this:
[query type=textref sql="SET NAMES UTF8"][/query]
before ANY update query.

Is there a way to set global mysql UTF8 ?

P.S.
In the previous version:
Debian GNU/Linux 6.0
Interchange V5.6.3
mysql 5.1.73
with the same catalogue and same database with latin1 charset all over i 
haven't this problem.

Any suggestion ?
GREAT thanks.
Marco.

-- 
"Fino alla bara sinpara"
"Up to demise we rize"