The ruling follows the deadly breach of the Córrego de Feijão dam in Brumadinho last month, with 134 people confirmed dead and another 199 still missing according to the latest tally on Monday, Reuters reported.

Vale said three of the dams listed by the court, which had been built by the upstream method, were already inactive and part of the accelerated decommissioning plan the company announced on January 29, which is expected to impact annual production by about 10% or 40 million tonnes of iron ore.

It said the remaining five dams listed were built by the conventional method and it understood there was no technical basis nor risk assessment to justify their suspension.

"The estimated impact of the temporary halting of the Laranjeiras dam at the Brucutu mine (Minas Centrais complex) is approximately 30 million tonnes of iron ore per year," the company said.

"Vale informs that it will adopt the appropriate legal measures in relation to this decision and reiterates that all the emergency measures necessary to assist the impacted people and to mitigate the impacts resulting from the breach of Dam I of the Córrego de Feijão mine are being duly adopted."

Vale had decided in 2016 to decommission all of its 19 upstream dams after the deadly Samarco tailings dam disaster and nine have already been decommissioned.

It said yesterday it would temporarily halt operations at the Vargem Grande Complex to accelerate its upstream dam decommissioning, which would account for about 13Mt of the 40Mt impact.

It has said the impact would be "partially offset" by an increase in production elsewhere in the company.

Vale shares closed more than 3% lower yesterday, representing a drop of 12.39% year-to-date.