Originally Posted by
AlwaysAisle
Yes, as
joejones indicated, as far as bilateral air service agreement is concerned, the country is usually concerned with air service access of airlines of their own country. Countries usually do not care if airlines from opposing countries do make use out of agreed air service. Quatar is a good example. Japan and Qatar have air service agreement, and part of the agreement is access to HND. This is the reason QR was awarded a slot at HND. But no airlines from Japan is serving Qatar (DOH) from HND and no Japanese airlines was awarded a slot at HND to serve Qatar (DOH) but Qatar does not care at all.
The night time slots that Qatar is using are far less restricted than the day time slots. Which is why they are not assigned in bilateral pairs. Emirates also flies at that time without a Japanese carrier flying the route. Which is also why there are 3 Japanese departures Haneda to Heathrow, and only 2 UK slots.
An interesting part in this is also the configuration, the QR A351 had 327 seats and their 77W over 300 Y seats. A JAL 787-9 can max weigh in with 231 seats.