Abuja, August 27 (RHC)-- Boko Haram militants have taken control of more Nigerian towns as they press ahead with their attacks in the African country.

A Cameroonian police source said on Tuesday that Boko Haram militants moved into the Nigerian town of Ashigashyia overnight Monday, where they killed three people in front of a church, after soldiers sent there fled to take refuge across the border in nearby Cameroon.

Nearly 500 Nigerian soldiers escaped from the border towns of Ashigashyia and Kerawa over the weekend to take refuge from Boko Haram on Cameroonian territory.

On Monday, the Nigerian army dismissed reports that the soldiers had fled, claiming that it was a “tactical maneuver” as they pursued the militants. However, the officials in Cameroon said the troops fought a rearguard battle in the town of Gamboru Ngala before pulling out as they were outnumbered.

Boko Haram militants also stormed Gamboru Ngala early on Monday and by evening had taken over the police station, a military barracks and vocational training center, where they had based themselves.