The latest in a wave of international media attention is Dutch TV company RTL News, which ventured overseas to meet with some of the Save the Confluence organizers and spokesperson Renae Yellowhorse.

Here is their report, in Dutch. (UPDATE: Translation below. Thanks Mirjam Kapoen, one of our supporters in the Netherlands!)

RTL NEWS January 1st 2015

A quarrel over the Grand Canyon, one of the most scenic areas of America. Perhaps the world.

A tribe wants to build hotels on the edge of the famous gorge and perhaps an aerial tramway to the bottom of the Canyon. That might be fun for tourists, but will ruin a unique landscape according to environmentalists. Also, not all Native Americans are happy with this.

The land of the Canyons. This incredible natural spectacle was created tens of millions of years ago, when water made its way through stone. Tourists cannot get enough of it, but there is also a part of the Canyon which is barely accessible.

A hour and half ride through a stony steppe and then suddenly:  In this pristine place in the Grand Canyon, two rivers come together. Tourists do not come here, because this is the land of the Native Americans. But now there is a plan for a tramway and a restaurant down there. This place where the red water from a tributary joins the Colorado river, is wonderful, but says Navajo activist Renae Yellowhorse, for her people this is a religious site that appears in the story of the origin of man.

(quote 1: Renae)

Here you have to pray and be silent, she says. And when you hear what they want to build here:

(quote 2: Renae)

The developer did not want to speak for our camera or even release the plans. But another indigenous people has successfully built an attraction built on the edge of the Canyon, so a Navajo politician ask: why should we stay behind?

(quote 3: Ben Shelley)

Tourists would be delighted to have access to this part of the Canyon.

(quote 4: male and female tourists)

but Earlene Reid whose family has for generations held cattle onto the edge of the Canyon doesn’t welcome this.

(quote 5: Earlene)

and Renae demands that people leave this place alone

(quote 6: Renae).

Now there is political and legal battle over the building schemes; at stake: one of the most beautiful places in America.

Sign off : Erik Mouthaan RTL News in the Grand Canyon.