Foreign Office officials ignored dire warnings about impending war in Sudan in the weeks before the unfolding tragedy, MPs have been told.
Just 10 days before the outbreak of violence - which has seen more than 2.2 million people forced from their homes - officials said they were "cautiously optimistic" fighting wouldn't break out, it is claimed.
And a charity chief said she's met people who have lost 10 family members in the brutal conflict, which has claimed at least 3,000 lives - but the real death toll is believed to be much higher.
Maddy Crowther, co-executive director of Waging Peace, told members of the Foreign Affairs Committee: "We had people tell us in the weeks before 15 April they were leaving Khartoum because they could smell war in the air.
"I don't see how the Foreign Office and the Embassy in particular couldn't feel that and couldn't see the warning signs when they were so clear."
And outlining the heartbreaking impact of the war, she said: "We held a community picnic on Sunday, there were 100 members of the British and Sudanese community.
"There were people there who had 10 familiy members dead, or eight or five. As just a snapshot of what was happening in Darfur the fact that people 5,000 miles away were telling us they'd had so many relatives die is indicative of the violence."
She said that Sudanese nationals are the eight largest group among asylum seekers arriving in the UK, and called for thousands of them to be allowed to stay and rebuild their lives.
Latest Home Office figures show more than 5,000 are awaiting a decision on their applications, she told committee members.
"There's no realistic way we're returning people to Sudan, why are we keeping peoples' lives in limbo, why are are not letting them rebuild in the UK?"
Meanwhile Dr Kate Ferguson, co-director of charity Protection Approaches, said repeated warnings about the deteriorating situation in Sudan weren't acted upon.
She claimed there was a "reluctance" to accept the danger of atrocities, and just 10 days before attacks broke out on April 15, she was told the Foreign Office was "cautiously optimistic".
"I'm sorry if I sound angry and emotional, but I am. We told them," she told the cross-party committee.
"I don't think they were adequately resourced. There was no communication protocol on place, there was no preparedness strategy and there was no central guidance coming from Whitehall, which makes it very difficult for the embassy."
Tory MP Alicia Kearns, who chairs the committee, said: "I agree entirely that the entire embassy seems to have been completely blindsided. Most people were on holiday because it was Eid.
"In some ways thank god because some of their children weren't in the country, but a lot of Sudanese children suffered as a result of them not realising what was happening."
Sudan descended into chaos after fighting erupted in mid-April between the military, led by General Abdel-Fattah Burhan, and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, commanded by General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo.
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