SEOUL (AFP) - Nearly 3,000 North Koreans were believed dead or missing following floods and landslides in the impoverished country, a respected South Korean human rights group has said.

Monsoon rains caused much more damage than the secretive North's state media have claimed, said Good Friends, an independent rights group which in the past has provided accurate information about the isolated communist country.

"North Korea has suffered really severe damage from recent rains, with nearly 3,000 people known to have been recorded dead or missing," the group said in a statement Wednesday.

"Damage and casualties are far heavier than known so far to the outside world," it said.