Try to use utf8_general_ci
utf8_bin
as collation for the column in MySQL.
This doesn't seem to be a Java problem, but a MySQL problem.
Find more about collations here
This is the correct CREATE TABLE
CREATE TABLE `locations_coordinates` (
`COUNTRY` varchar(255) CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_bin NOT NULL DEFAULT '',
`LOCATION` varchar(255) CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_bin NOT NULL DEFAULT '',
`LATITUDE` double DEFAULT NULL,
`LONGITUDE` double DEFAULT NULL,
PRIMARY KEY (`COUNTRY`,`LOCATION`)
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8;