Для чтение кириллицы в начале файла пишем:

FileEncoding, UTF-8 ; задаем кодировку для чтения из файла

FileEncoding [, Encoding]

Select

Encoding can be one of the following values:

• UTF-8: Unicode UTF-8, equivalent to CP65001.
• UTF-16: Unicode UTF-16 with little endian byte order, equivalent to CP1200.
• UTF-8-RAW or UTF-16-RAW: As above, but no byte order mark is written when a new file is created.
• CPnnn: a code page with numeric identifier nnn. See Code Page Identifiers.
• Empty or omitted: the system default ANSI code page, which is also the default setting.

Remarks

A_FileEncoding contains the current setting.