ABOVE: Watch the full press conference with Tima Kurdi.
Tima Kurdi, the aunt of the two Syrian boys who drowned off the coast of Turkey, said she blames herself for what happened to them.
“I am the one who should be at blame,” she said, speaking outside her Coquitlam home.
The family fled the war-ravaged city of Kobani and was trying to get to the Greek island of Kos and onward to a safer life.
Abdullah Kurdi was unable to save his sons three-year-old Alan, five-year-old Ghalib and wife Rehan.
Alan’s limp body was seen washed ashore on a Turkish beach in a haunting photograph on Wednesday.
READ MORE: ‘They didn’t deserve to die’: aunt of Syrian boys who drowned off Turkey
Tima says the family was nervous to take a boat to Greece but felt they didn’t have any other choice.
She said Abdullah told her that his kids mean the world to him and he would never buy the fake ones.
Even though three-year-old Alan was photographed not wearing life jacket, Tima said Abdullah put jackets on his children but they hit so many rocks on the crossing that the jackets came off.
WATCH: How Syrian father paid smugglers to take family to Europe
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Now Tima said the family hopes their tragedy will spur change.
“He said I don’t need anything from this world anymore. What I had was gone.”
WATCH: Syrian father see’s children’s death as a wakeup call
Tima is still going to still work to bring her family members to Canada. “Abdullah is my number one,” she says. She also wants to bring her family from Germany, Turkey, Damascus and Syria.
Even though Mohammed has said he does not want to come to Canada, Tima wants to bring him here one day.
“He can not be by himself there,” she said.
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