A South Korean aid group says famine has started to cause deaths in North Korea.

The aid group Good Friends said Friday in its weekly newsletter that farmers are dying of starvation in rural villages near Sariwon, North Hwanghae Province. But the group did not give the source of its information.

Citing an unidentified senior official of the North Korean Workers' Party, the group also said the North's food situation is as bad as it was in the late 1990s, when millions are believed to have starved to death.

Good Friends called on Seoul to swiftly provide humanitarian aid to prevent mass starvation in North Korea.