On 27 October 1940, the Empire Defense Council () was constituted to organise the rule of the territories in central Africa, Asia, and Oceania that had heeded the 18 June call. It was replaced on 24 September 1941 by the French National Committee ( or CNF). On 13 July 1942, "Free France" was officially renamed Fighting France () to mark that the struggle against the Axis was conducted both externally by the FFF and internally by the French Forces of the Interior (FFI). After the reconquest of North Africa, this was in turn formally merged with de Gaulle's rival general Henri Giraud's command in Algiers to form the French Committee of National Liberation ( or CFNL). Exile officially ended with the liberation of Paris by the 2nd Armoured Free French Division and Resistance forces on 25 August 1944, ushering in the Provisional Government of the French Republic ( or GPRF). It ruled France until the end of the war and afterwards to 1946, when the Fourth Republic was established, thus ending the series of interim regimes that had succeeded the Third Republic after its fall in 1940.