Jakarta – Indonesia's government Thursday threatened legal action against US mining giant Freeport unless the company improved the environmental record of its massive gold mine in Papua province.

The announcement follows several recent demonstrations against the company, some of which have called on the government to take over the mine, run by a local unit of Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (FCX).

Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar said the mine would be given between "two and three years" to undertake improvements in the management of the millions of tons of waste ore, known as tailings, that are pumped out of the mine each year.

Reacting to the announcement, Freeport spokesman Siddharta Moersjid the company "has the same objective as the Ministry of Environment, which is to minimize the impact of our mining operations to the environment." He said the company would continue to cooperate with the ministry.

The environment minister said there were fears that tailings could start piling up and possibly trigger landslides or flooding in communities living close to the mine in the highlands of Papua province in Indonesia's far east.

Witoelar said that if the problems remained unresolved then his ministry would file a lawsuit against the mine, similar to the one that was pursued against fellow US miner Newmont (NEM) over alleged pollution at its mine.

Witoelar made the declaration after receiving a report by a team of independent experts tasked with assessing whether Freeport's mine was damaging the environment. He said the mine had committed various violations, of which the tailing issues was the most pressing.