( CNN ) Suspected Boko Haram militants this week attacked civilians inside Cameroon for the first time in a month , killing at least 16 villagers , a military spokesman told CNN Saturday . Six attackers were killed by Cameroonian forces , said Maj. Nlate Eballe , an operations officer with a special military unit set up to fight Boko Haram . The attackers came Thursday `` in the hundreds ... torched Dia village in the Far North Region , '' he said . Dia is a village that borders Lake Chad and has been identified as a recruiting ground for Boko Haram . Regional Gov . Mijiyawa Bakary said the insurgents have been attacking border villages in Cameroon in search of supplies . Cameroonian troops retook cattle that was stolen by the attackers in Dia , Eballe said . The last attack in Cameroon by the Nigeria-based militants was March 10 , when the assailants struck the locality of Kerawa-Mafa in a failed attempt to overrun a military base . Boko Haram , whose name translates as `` Western education is sin , '' has been waging a years-long campaign of terror aimed at instituting its extreme version of Sharia law in Nigeria . Boko Haram 's tactics have intensified in recent years , from battling Nigerian government soldiers to acts disproportionately affecting civilians -- such as raids on villages , mass kidnappings , assassinations , market bombings and attacks on churches and unaffiliated mosques . Much of this violence has taken place in Nigeria , but neighboring countries -- Cameroon included -- have also been hit increasingly hard . Journalist Ngala Killian Chimtom in Yaounde , Cameroon , contributed to this report .
Six Boko Haram militants were killed , military spokesman says . Hundreds were involved in the raid on a village in far north . Boko Haram is based in Nigeria but has attacked across the border of several neighbors .