diff --git a/crates/intent/Cargo.lock b/crates/intent/Cargo.lock
index e5be080..d5c9222 100644
--- a/crates/intent/Cargo.lock
+++ b/crates/intent/Cargo.lock
@@ -906,6 +906,7 @@ dependencies = [
  "clap",
  "jsonschema",
  "parking_lot",
+ "regex",
  "serde",
  "serde_json",
  "tempfile",
diff --git a/crates/intent/Cargo.toml b/crates/intent/Cargo.toml
index b0a4aa1..f9a2a73 100644
--- a/crates/intent/Cargo.toml
+++ b/crates/intent/Cargo.toml
@@ -16,6 +16,7 @@ path = "src/lib.rs"
 clap = { version = "4.5", features = ["derive", "env", "string"] }
 serde = { version = "1.0", features = ["derive"] }
 serde_json = "1.0"
+regex = "1"
 ai-gateway = { git = "https://github.com/overengineeringstudio/effect-utils", rev = "61cdf616db95c56fd016b1b78d6dc3010fd83f3c" }
 jsonschema = { version = "=0.58.6", default-features = false }
 tokio = { version = "1", features = ["rt", "time"] }
diff --git a/crates/intent/README.md b/crates/intent/README.md
index cf290a5..4669f7f 100644
--- a/crates/intent/README.md
+++ b/crates/intent/README.md
@@ -37,6 +37,13 @@ label; local links expose their normalized repository-relative path, while
 external links have no target location. Citation records expose the normalized
 ID or ordinal and the scope used for resolution.
 
+Heading anchors lowercase Unicode text, retain alphabetic characters, decimal
+and letter numbers, combining marks and connector punctuation, and replace each
+ASCII space with a hyphen. Other numbers and non-alphabetic symbols are removed.
+Existing hyphens are neither collapsed nor trimmed. Graph extraction and link
+checking share this reduction.
+Repeated headings receive collision-safe `-1`, `-2`, … suffixes within a file.
+
 ## `check` exiting 0 does not mean it read anything
 
 `intent check` on an empty directory, or on a path holding no Intent artifacts at all,
diff --git a/crates/intent/src/graph_references.rs b/crates/intent/src/graph_references.rs
index fff955c..e769bcc 100644
--- a/crates/intent/src/graph_references.rs
+++ b/crates/intent/src/graph_references.rs
@@ -663,19 +663,25 @@ fn anchors_in(document: &Document) -> BTreeMap<String, SourceLocation> {
     anchors
 }
 
-fn github_anchor(heading: &str) -> String {
-    let mut output = String::new();
-    let mut last_dash = false;
+pub(crate) fn github_anchor(heading: &str) -> String {
+    static UNICODE_ANCHOR_CHARACTER: std::sync::LazyLock<regex::Regex> =
+        std::sync::LazyLock::new(|| {
+            regex::Regex::new(r"\A[\p{Alphabetic}\p{Nd}\p{Nl}\p{M}\p{Pc}]\z")
+                .expect("valid GitHub anchor character pattern")
+        });
+    let mut output = String::with_capacity(heading.len());
+    let mut encoded = [0; 4];
     for ch in heading.chars().flat_map(char::to_lowercase) {
-        if ch.is_ascii_alphanumeric() {
-            output.push(ch);
-            last_dash = false;
-        } else if (ch.is_whitespace() || ch == '-') && !last_dash && !output.is_empty() {
+        if ch == ' ' {
             output.push('-');
-            last_dash = true;
+        } else if ch.is_ascii_alphanumeric()
+            || matches!(ch, '-' | '_')
+            || (!ch.is_ascii() && UNICODE_ANCHOR_CHARACTER.is_match(ch.encode_utf8(&mut encoded)))
+        {
+            output.push(ch);
         }
     }
-    output.trim_matches('-').to_string()
+    output
 }
 
 fn req_traces_in(document: &Document) -> Vec<ReqTrace> {
@@ -1273,3 +1279,62 @@ fn relative_display(root: &Path, path: &Path) -> String {
 fn first_line_end(content: &str) -> usize {
     content.find('\n').unwrap_or(content.len())
 }
+
+#[cfg(test)]
+mod tests {
+    use super::*;
+
+    #[test]
+    fn github_heading_anchors_preserve_spacing_and_unicode() {
+        for (heading, expected) in [
+            ("Phase C — molty retirement", "phase-c--molty-retirement"),
+            ("Phase C – molty retirement", "phase-c--molty-retirement"),
+            (" - ", "---"),
+            ("! leading and trailing ? ", "-leading-and-trailing--"),
+            ("a.b:c/d(e)&f", "abcdef"),
+            ("`code`", "code"),
+            ("hello 😀 world", "hello--world"),
+            ("Übersicht", "übersicht"),
+            ("e\u{301} Ⅳ ٢", "e\u{301}-ⅳ-٢"),
+            ("under_score ‿ connector", "under_score-‿-connector"),
+            ("*emphasis*", "emphasis"),
+            ("a\tb", "ab"),
+            ("--already--", "--already--"),
+            ("x²", "x"),
+            ("x½", "x"),
+            ("x①", "x"),
+            ("ⓐ", "ⓐ"),
+            // Representative category fixtures from github-slugger@3461c435,
+            // test/fixtures.json: Other_Number and Other_Symbol.
+            ("a² ¹ ½ ৴ ৶ ৹b", "a-----b"),
+            ("a¦ ୰ Ⓔ Ⓣ ⓘ ⓨ 🄺 🅙 🅨 🅻b", "a--ⓔ-ⓣ-ⓘ-ⓨ-🄺-🅙-🅨-🅻b"),
+            ("heading with a - dash", "heading-with-a---dash"),
+            ("Привет non-latin 你好", "привет-non-latin-你好"),
+        ] {
+            assert_eq!(github_anchor(heading), expected, "{heading:?}");
+        }
+    }
+
+    #[test]
+    fn repeated_heading_anchors_keep_collision_suffixes() {
+        let content = "# Phase C — molty retirement\n# Phase C — molty retirement\n\
+                       # Phase C — molty retirement-1\n# Phase C — molty retirement\n";
+        let document = Document {
+            path: PathBuf::from("test.md"),
+            repo_path: "test.md".to_string(),
+            content: content.to_string(),
+            line_starts: std::iter::once(0)
+                .chain(content.match_indices('\n').map(|(index, _)| index + 1))
+                .collect(),
+        };
+        let anchors = anchors_in(&document);
+        for anchor in [
+            "phase-c--molty-retirement",
+            "phase-c--molty-retirement-1",
+            "phase-c--molty-retirement-1-1",
+            "phase-c--molty-retirement-2",
+        ] {
+            assert!(anchors.contains_key(anchor), "{anchor}");
+        }
+    }
+}
diff --git a/crates/intent/src/lib.rs b/crates/intent/src/lib.rs
index ba6dc85..d2ade28 100644
--- a/crates/intent/src/lib.rs
+++ b/crates/intent/src/lib.rs
@@ -2074,7 +2074,7 @@ fn anchors_for(content: &str) -> HashSet<String> {
         if heading.is_empty() {
             continue;
         }
-        let mut anchor = github_anchor(heading);
+        let mut anchor = graph_references::github_anchor(heading);
         let base = anchor.clone();
         let mut index = 1;
         while seen.contains(&anchor) {
@@ -2087,21 +2087,6 @@ fn anchors_for(content: &str) -> HashSet<String> {
     anchors
 }
 
-fn github_anchor(heading: &str) -> String {
-    let mut out = String::new();
-    let mut last_dash = false;
-    for ch in heading.chars().flat_map(char::to_lowercase) {
-        if ch.is_ascii_alphanumeric() {
-            out.push(ch);
-            last_dash = false;
-        } else if (ch.is_whitespace() || ch == '-') && !last_dash && !out.is_empty() {
-            out.push('-');
-            last_dash = true;
-        }
-    }
-    out.trim_matches('-').to_string()
-}
-
 #[derive(Debug)]
 struct Section {
     heading: String,
diff --git a/crates/intent/tests/intent_check.rs b/crates/intent/tests/intent_check.rs
index 49705ae..406c0a2 100644
--- a/crates/intent/tests/intent_check.rs
+++ b/crates/intent/tests/intent_check.rs
@@ -552,6 +552,26 @@ fn valid_minimal_intent_tree_passes_json_check() {
     assert_eq!(report["diagnostics"].as_array().unwrap().len(), 0);
 }
 
+#[test]
+fn check_resolves_em_dash_heading_anchors_locally_and_across_files() {
+    let h = Harness::new();
+    fs::write(
+        h.repo.join("context/intent/spec.md"),
+        "# Phase C — molty retirement\n\nSee [local](#phase-c--molty-retirement).\n",
+    )
+    .expect("heading with local link");
+    fs::write(
+        h.repo.join("context/intent/requirements.md"),
+        "# Requirements\n\nSee [phase](./spec.md#phase-c--molty-retirement).\n",
+    )
+    .expect("cross-file heading link");
+
+    let output = h.check(&["--json", "--profile", "strict"]);
+    let report = stdout_json(&output);
+    assert!(output.status.success(), "{report}");
+    assert_eq!(report["diagnostics"].as_array().unwrap().len(), 0);
+}
+
 #[test]
 fn missing_local_markdown_links_are_transitional_locally_and_blocking_in_strict_profile() {
     let h = Harness::new();