Military analyst Michael Clarke has been assessing the feasibility of the US and Iran coming to an agreement at peace talks in Pakistan tomorrow.

It’s “almost impossible” to see how the US 15-point proposal and Iran’s earlier 10-point peace plan could be knitted together into any sort of compromise, he says.

“At the moment, they’re both talking past each other with maximalist demands that neither side are going to accept.

“So you can look for the area in between, for a couple of points where they might create agreement, but there’s too many showstoppers there, in my view, for them to agree. 

“If these talks are to be successful, they’ll have to find different forms of words. 

“They’ll kick the can down the road again and they’ll say, we can’t agree now, we’ll meet again in a week’s time.”

Iran’s “showstoppers” include their demand to have a civil nuclear programme, and to keep possession of its highly enriched uranium stockpiles, Clarke said – something Donald Trump has made clear he won’t accept.