US Embassy in Iraq facing cuts amid ongoing violence

BAGHDAD -- The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is facing a 10 percent funding cut next year but top officials say it will still be one of America's largest diplomatic missions in the world.

Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides says contracting costs will be tightened and diplomatic outposts may be trimmed as part of the $4.8 billion spending plan the State Department is requesting in 2013.

Nides told reporters in Baghdad on Wednesday that security costs will be the last expense to be cut.

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He declined to estimate how many in the current work force of 16,000 embassy employees would remain after an ongoing review during what he described as a "transition" year.

When it opened in 2009, the embassy was the largest U.S. mission in the world. 

Earlier in the day, officials said gunmen wearing military uniforms killed the wife and two children of an Iraqi policeman in an attack on his home south of Baghdad.

Read: US to 'right-size' embassy in Iraq

Police officials said the gunmen stormed the house Wednesday morning in the town of Jurf al-Sakhar, about 30 miles south of Baghdad. Among the dead was a one-year-old girl.

The policeman was seriously wounded and taken to a nearby hospital.

A hospital medic confirmed the death toll.

Since the U.S. pullout in December, militant groups have stepped up attacks on Iraq's security forces in an attempt to undermine public confidence in the Shiite-dominated government's ability to protect its citizens.

All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

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