Mysql>php>flash: problem with special characters!

Hi,

I’m working on a project where I fill textboxes in Flash with content from a mysql db. This is working pretty fine, but somehow characters like “é” and “è”, “ë” etc… aren’t displayed.

I made sure the font is included (uppercase, lowercase, numerals AND punctuation) and I included the specified characters again with the “include these characters-box”.

However, when I put a trace-command, they don’t appear in the output-box:
Italië comes out as : “Itali�i”

It’s got something to do with the mysql-collocation I’m guessing and/or the string handling by the php-script. This is what I do:

$output=NULL;
    while($w = mysql_fetch_object($r)) {
          $output .= '<font color="#FDEACE" size="12">'. nl2br(stripslashes(ereg_replace("\r",'',$w->content))). '</font><br />';
    }
    $output = urlencode($output); // zorg voor veilig netwerk transfer naar flash
    
    echo '&r=1&b='.urlencode('nieuws succesvol opgehaald'). '&n=' . $output . '&';  

where lies the fault?
or has it got something to do with the collocation in the mysql-db ?