Prosecutors have downgraded the involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin, reducing the possible prison time the Hollywood star may face for the 2021 fatal shooting on the set of the movie "Rust," charging documents showed.

New Mexico First Judicial District Attorney Mary Carmack-Altwies had charged Baldwin and the movie's set armorer, Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, with two counts of involuntary manslaughter last month for the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, with the most serious charge carrying a potential prison sentence of five years.

Carmack-Altwies filed altered charges for Baldwin and Gutierrez-Reed on Friday, removing the firearm enhancement and reducing their possible prison sentence from a minimum of five years to a maximum of 18 months.

"In order to avoid further litigious distractions by Mr. Baldwin and his attorneys, the district attorney and the special prosecutor have removed the firearm enhancement to the involuntary manslaughter charges in the death of Halyna Hutchins on the "Rust" film set," Heather Brewer, a spokesperson for the New Mexico First Judicial District Attorney, said in a statement.

A lawyer for Baldwin did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We applaud the decision of the district attorney to dismiss the firearm enhancement and it was the right call, ethically, and on the merits," said Jason Bowles, an attorney for Gutierrez-Reed.

Lawyers for Baldwin and Gutierrez-Reed had argued earlier this month that prosecutors were unjustly charging their clients under a version of the firearm enhancement law that had not been passed until May 2022, months after the incident.

When the incident occurred, New Mexico law stated that the firearm enhancement should be applied when a firearm was "brandished" in the commission of a noncapital felony, meaning the suspect had an intention to harm.

In 2022, the criteria for applying the firearm enhancement -with the 5-year minimum prison sentence - was expanded to include when a weapon was simply "discharged" in the commission of a noncapital felony.

Baldwin's case is remarkable in that there is little or no precedent for a Hollywood actor to face criminal charges for an on-set shooting.

The "30 Rock" actor has denied responsibility for the shooting, which also injured the movie's director Joel Souza. He has said he cocked the revolver but never pulled the trigger and it was the job of Gutierrez-Reed and other weapons professionals to ensure it was unloaded.

Videos from inside the church prior to the shooting show Baldwin with his finger on the trigger, the prosecution's special investigator, Robert Shilling, said in a statement of probable cause.

An FBI forensic test of the revolver found it "functioned normally" and would not fire without the trigger being pulled.

Gutierrez-Reed testified to New Mexico's worker safety agency (OSHA) on Dec. 7 that the shooting might have been prevented had she had more time to train Baldwin. She said he had "poor form" when using the revolver.

Charging documents held Gutierrez-Reed responsible for "allowing live ammunition on the set," but did not accuse her of physically introducing them onto the production.

Baldwin and Gutierrez-Reed are both expected to make an initial court appearance in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on Feb. 24.

Alec Baldwin attends the 2022 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Ripple of Hope Award Gala in New York City, U.S., December 6, 2022. REUTERS/Andrew Kelly

Another earthquake struck the border region of Turkey and Syria on Monday, just two weeks after the area was devastated by a larger quake that killed more than 47,000 people and damaged or destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes.

Monday's quake , this time with a magnitude of 6.4, was centred near the southern Turkish city of Antakya and was felt in Syria, Egypt and Lebanon.

It struck at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles), the European Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC) said.

Hatay Mayor Lutfu Savas told HaberTurk broadcaster that he had received reports about some people stuck under rubble after the latest quake. Three people were killed and more than 200 injured, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said.

In Samandag, where the country's Disaster and Emergency Management Authority AFAD reported one person dead, residents said more buildings collapsed but most of the town had already fled after the initial earthquakes. Mounds of debris and discarded furniture lined the dark, abandoned streets.

Muna Al Omar said she was in a tent in a park in central Antakya when the ground started heaving again.

"I thought the earth was going to split open under my feet," she said, crying as she held her 7-year-old son in her arms.

Hours earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on a visit to Turkey that Washington would help "for as long as it takes" as rescue operations in the wake of the Feb. 6 earthquake and its aftershocks were winding down, and focus turned to toward urgent shelter and reconstruction work.

The death toll from the quakes two weeks ago rose to 41,156 in Turkey, AFAD said on Monday, and it was expected to climb further, with 385,000 apartments known to have been destroyed or seriously damaged and many people still missing.

President Tayyip Erdogan said construction work on nearly 200,000 apartments in 11 earthquake-hit provinces of Turkey would begin next month .

Total U.S. humanitarian assistance to support the earthquake response in Turkey and Syria has reached $185 million, the U.S. State Department said.

Among the survivors of the earthquakes are about 356,000 pregnant women who urgently need access to health services, the U.N. sexual and reproductive health agency has said.

They include 226,000 women in Turkey and 130,000 in Syria, about 38,800 of whom will deliver in the next month. Many of them were sheltering in camps or exposed to freezing temperatures and struggling to get food or clean water.

In Syria, already shattered by more than a decade of civil war, most deaths have been in the northwest, where the United Nations said 4,525 people were killed. The area is controlled by insurgents at war with forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, complicating aid efforts.

Syrian officials say 1,414 people were killed in areas under the control of Assad's government.

Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said a convoy of 14 of its trucks had entered northwestern Syria from Turkey on Sunday to assist in rescue operations.

The World Food Programme has also been pressuring authorities in that region to stop blocking access for aid from Syrian government-controlled areas.

As of Monday morning, 197 trucks loaded with U.N. humanitarian aid had entered northwest Syria through two border crossings, a spokesperson for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

Thousands of Syrian refugees in Turkey have returned to their homes in northwest Syria to get in touch with relatives affected by the devastation.

At the Turkish Cilvegozu border crossing, hundreds of Syrians lined up starting early on Monday to cross.

Mustafa Hannan, who dropped off his pregnant wife and 3-year-old son, said he saw about 350 people waiting.

The 27-year-old car electrician said his family was leaving for a few months after their home in Antakya collapsed, taking up a pledge by authorities allowing them to spend up to six months in Syria without losing the chance to return to Turkey.

"I'm worried they won't be allowed back," he said. "We've already been separated from our nation. Are we going to be separated from our families now too? If I rebuild here but they can't return, my life will be lost."

People react after an earthquake in Antakya in Hatay province, Turkey, February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne People react after an earthquake in Antakya in Hatay province, Turkey, February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne A woman rests after an earthquake in Antakya in Hatay province, Turkey, February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Clodagh Kilcoyne A man speaks on the phone as he sits by a fire near a destroyed building in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake in Antakya, Turkey February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu arrive at a meeting in Ankara, Turkey February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Cagla Gurdogan Volunteers share meals in a camp in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake in Antakya, Turkey February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov Red balloons attached to parts of a destroyed apartment building are seen, in the aftermath of the deadly earthquake, in Antakya, Turkey February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Nir Elias A healthcare professional rides a motor scooter next to balloons attached to rubble and dedicated to children who died in the earthquake in Hatay, Turkey, February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov A view shows a field hospital set up by Britain, in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake in Turkoglu district of Kahramanmaras, Turkey, February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani Destroyed buildings are seen at night in the aftermath of a deadly earthquake in Antakya, Turkey February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov

U.S. President Joe Biden walked around central Kyiv on an unannounced visit on Monday, promising to stand with Ukraine as long as it takes, on a trip timed to upstage the Kremlin ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion.

Biden, in his trademark aviator sunglasses, and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in green battle fatigues, walked side-by-side to a gold-domed cathedral on a bright winter morning pierced by the sound of air raid sirens.

"When (Russian President Vladimir) Putin launched his invasion nearly one year ago, he thought Ukraine was weak and the West was divided. He thought he could outlast us. But he was dead wrong," Biden said .

"The cost that Ukraine has had to pay is extraordinarily high. Sacrifices have been far too great. ... We know that there will be difficult days and weeks and years ahead."

Outside the cathedral, burned-out Russian tanks stand as a symbol of Moscow's failed assault on the capital at the outset of its invasion, which began on Feb. 24. Its forces swiftly reached Kyiv's ramparts - only to be turned back by unexpectedly fierce resistance.

Since then, Russia's war has killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians and soldiers on both sides, cities have been reduced to rubble, and millions of refugees have fled. Russia says it has annexed nearly a fifth of Ukraine, while the West has pledged tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Kyiv.

"This visit of the U.S. president to Ukraine, the first for 15 years, is the most important visit in the entire history of Ukraine-U.S. relations," Zelenskiy said.

Biden traveled to Ukraine's capital by overnight train from Poland , arriving after roughly 10 hours at 8 a.m. on Monday, before returning there the same way, leaving just after 1 p.m. (1100 GMT), according to a White House pool report by a Wall Street Journal reporter.

Biden arrived late on Monday in Warsaw, where he is scheduled to meet Poland's President Andrzej Duda, along with other leaders of countries on NATO's eastern flank, the following day.

While Biden was in Kyiv, the State Department announced a further $460 million in U.S. aid to Ukraine, including $450 million worth of artillery ammunition, anti-armor systems and air defense radars, and $10 million for energy infrastructure.

The European Union's foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said the bloc would approve more sanctions before the anniversary of the conflict, which Russia says is a "special military operation."

Russia was notified before Biden's departure, officials in Washington and Moscow said, apparently to avoid the risk of an attack on Kyiv while he was there.

The trip took place a day before Putin was due to make a major address on Tuesday, setting out aims for the second year of what he now calls a proxy war against the armed might of Washington and the trans-Atlantic military alliance NATO.

"Of course for the Kremlin this will be seen as further proof that the United States has bet on Russia's strategic defeat in the war and that the war itself has turned irrevocably into a war between Russia and the West," said Tatiana Stanovaya, a Russian political analyst.

Russia has sent thousands of conscripts into Ukraine for a winter offensive but has secured only scant gains so far in assaults in frozen trenches up and down the eastern front in recent weeks. Kyiv and the West see it as a push to give Putin victories to tout a year after he launched Europe's biggest war since World War Two.

Moscow received its own signal of diplomatic support on Monday, with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi expected for talks . In public, China has remained neutral over the conflict despite signing a "no limits" friendship pact with Russia weeks before the invasion.

Washington has said in recent days it is concerned Beijing could begin supplying Moscow with arms. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said the United States was "in no position to make demands of China".

A diplomatic source speaking on condition of anonymity told Reuters that Wang Yi would discuss Chinese ideas for a political settlement of the war. Ukraine says any diplomatic solution requires the withdrawal of Russian forces from its territory.

Russia is trying to secure full control of two eastern provinces forming Ukraine's Donbas industrial region. It has launched assaults at locations running from Kreminna in the north down to Vuhledar in the south, securing its biggest gains around the mining city of Bakhmut.

Kyiv, which is absorbing a major influx of Western weaponry in the coming months for a planned counteroffensive, has lately stuck mainly to defense on the battlefield, claiming to be inflicting huge casualties on the assaulting Russian forces.

Three civilians were killed in Russian shelling on Monday, regional Ukrainian officials said - one in the Donetsk region and two in the Kherson region.

Britain's Ministry of Defence said Russia's casualties included two elite brigades of thousands of marines probably rendered "combat ineffective" by losses sustained in failed attempts to storm Vuhledar.

"The Russian forces are likely under increasing political pressure as the anniversary of the invasion draws near," it said, predicting Moscow may claim to have captured Bakhmut regardless of the situation on the ground. "If Russia's spring offensive fails to achieve anything, then tensions within the Russian leadership will likely increase."

In a sign of such dissent, Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Putin ally whose Wagner private army has sent thousands of criminals recruited from prison into battle around Bakhmut, accused unidentified Russian officials of sabotaging his force by withholding weapons.

Inside Vuhledar, constant explosions shook the ruins. A pensioner emerged from the cellar where she lives with her dog, and showed a Reuters journalist around the rubble of her flat above, where a shell had blasted through the wall.

She said she had been saved when the room was hit because a fridge had fallen on top of her. A neighbor's daughter found her and dragged her out.

"Scary is not the word. It is terrifying," she said.

U.S. President Joe Biden walks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy at St. Michael's Golden-Domed Cathedral during an unannounced visit, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Monday, Feb. 20, 2023. Evan Vucci/Pool via REUTERS U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy visit Saint Michael’s cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich U.S. President Joe Biden poses with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi and Olena Zelenska at Mariinsky Palace on an unannounced visit, in Kyiv, Ukraine, February 20, 2023. Evan Vucci/Pool via REUTERS Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and U.S. President Joe Biden attend a meeting, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, February 20, 2023. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy embrace after their visit to the Wall of Remembrance to pay tribute to killed Ukrainian soldiers, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and U.S. President Joe Biden shake hands before a meeting, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk next to Saint Michael’s cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Viacheslav Ratynskyi U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk next to Saint Michael’s cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk next to Saint Michael's cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk next to Saint Michael’s cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy walk next to Saint Michael’s cathedral, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine February 20, 2023. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich U.S. President Joe Biden walks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy during an unannounced visit, in Kyiv, Ukraine, February 20, 2023. Evan Vucci/Pool via REUTERS People stand by a coffee stall at dusk, during a power shortage, amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Mykolaiv, Ukraine, February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Lisi Niesner A general view shows an apartment building damaged by a Russian military strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in the frontline city of Bakhmut in Donetsk region, Ukraine, February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Yevhen Titov Local residents walk on an empty street, as Russia's attack on Ukraine continues, in the frontline city of Bakhmut, Ukraine, February 19, 2023. REUTERS/Yevhen Titov