1) There is not a built in option for this.
The index is based on the content below it.
You could try using CSS to visually move it where you want.
2) In my tests it works fine with all UTF-8 character. So I would have to look into that.
Can you give me (super) admin and (s)ftp access so I can take a look?
And tell me on what url I can see/reproduce the issue.
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