The Discrete Optimization Network (DONET) will hold its Annual Conference from May 19-24, 1996 at Stirin Castle in Prague Area. The Stirin is a small high-baroque castle which has been recently renovated by its owner -ministry of foreign affairs- as a conference center and a stylish hotel. The castle is situated in a beautiful park which includes a golf course and tennis courts. The castle is small and it can accommodate up to 44 people. The common facilities include 2 conference rooms, 2 smaller saloons, chapel (used e.g. for concerts), etc. These facilities as well as restaurant are suitable to accommodate up to 60-70 people which we believe makes this ideal for our purposes.

We reserved the whole object for May 19-24, 1996 (the only possibility) and negotiated a good price. If there will be more participants than Stirin can accommodate then we reserved (a more modest) accommodation about 2km from Stirin.

We hope that the conference will lead to a substantial theoretical output as well as providing links to attractive and interesting problems which are solved in practice. We shall inform about the acceptance of our invited speakers. However we shall follow the format used at earlier meetings and we shall try to reserve maximum time for research and discussions. The ideal location and inspiring atmosphere of Stirin may play a positive role here.

The conference fee will be $100 for non-DONET members. The costs of accommodation with full pension, refreshments and banquet will be approximately $500-600 in Stirin and about $250-300 out of Stirin. We shall also try to provide transportation on May 19 and May 24. (These approximate figures will be cleared after we shall get a first response to this announcement and after detail negotiations with Stirin management.)

Martin Loebl
Jarik Nesetril