U.N. Under-Secretary-General for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, Valerie Amos, the top United Nations official for humanitarian assistance, said that the World Humanitarian Summit (WHS), which will be held in May 2016 in Istanbul, is crucially important for setting the future of the agenda for humanitarian action around the world. Speaking exclusively to Daily Sabah during her visit to Budapest to participate in a regional consultation meeting ahead of the 2016 WHS, Amos praised Turkey for hosting the milestone event: "The summit is of course the first of its kind and it will set the future agenda for humanitarian action around the world, where we are seeing more and more humanitarian response in areas that are affected by conflict, where needs are outpacing the resources of the capacity that we have, and Turkey is very important to Istanbul, as the place where the Summit will be held is crucial."Underlining Turkey's increasing role in humanitarian action around the world, Amos said that there are many example of it: "We have a Turkey that is playing a greater and greater role in humanitarian response efforts, we have seen, for example, the role Turkey played in difficult environments in difficult countries like Somalia, for instance, the support that Turkey is giving to Syrian refugees that have crossed the border from Syria into Turkey, who are looking for support. So Istanbul, Turkey is a recognition of the way that humanitarian response and the support to humanitarian response are changing across the world," she said.Amos also thanked the Turkish government for their continuous support of humanitarian actions. "I would like to thank the people of Turkey for their generosity and for hosting so many Syrian refugees. A big thank you to the government of Turkey for their continuous support for humanitarian actions around the world and also thank you for hosting the Humanitarian World Summit in Istanbul and the commitment to making it a success," she added.Regarding the U.N.'s cooperation with Turkey's Disaster and Emergency Management Agency (AFAD), she stressed that there is close cooperation in various areas: "We have very close cooperation with AFAD, we have a partnership agreement and we have worked very closely on identifying what the key issues are with respect to the humanitarian challenges inside Turkey and the neighboring countries as a result of the refugee flows."