Dozens of people have been killed and many more wounded in a series of bombings in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad. The death toll so far stands at 63, with another 185 injured. The attacks come as Iraq grapples with the aftermath of the U.S. military withdrawal and heightened sectarian tensions with an arrest warrant for Iraqi vice president and leading Sunni political leader Tariq al-Hashemi. At a news conference on Wednesday, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was asked about the ongoing U.S. presence in Iraq with a massive embassy in Baghdad.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki: “Perhaps some people say that the number [of U.S. embassy staff] is big. It is 2,000 or 3,000 employees. A part of this number represents Iraqi desire. For example, we asked them to provide us with agricultural experience, therefore we will need agricultural experts. We asked them to provide us industrial expertise, so we will need industrial experts. It is our demands that will be the reason to increase or decrease the number of staff that will serve in the U.S. embassy, but there will be no forces.”