is a river in

Hokkaido is the list of islands of Japan by area, second-largest island of Japan and comprises the largest and northernmost prefectures of Japan, prefecture, making up its own list of regions of Japan, region. The Tsugaru Strait separates Hokkaidō fr ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. The Saru River rises in the Hidaka Mountains and empties into the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is bounded by the cont ...

. It is considered sacred in traditional Ainu beliefs. The Nibutani Dam is situated on the Saru River, at Nibutani village. The construction of this dam was the subject of famous domestic litigation, producing the first ever Japanese legal decision to recognise the

Ainu people The Ainu are an Indigenous peoples, indigenous ethnic group who reside in northern Japan and southeastern Russia, including Hokkaido and the Tōhoku region of Honshu, as well as the land surrounding the Sea of Okhotsk, such as Sakhalin, the Ku ...

as an indigenous people. Construction of a second dam, the Biratori Dam is also planned by the Hokkaido Development Board. The 'Cultural Landscape along the Saru River resulting from Ainu Tradition and Modern Settlement' has been designated an Important Cultural Landscape.

References

Rivers of Hokkaido Rivers of Japan Biratori, Hokkaido Sacred rivers {{Japan-river-stub

See also

References